


Thirty First Kisses

by tiptoe39



Category: Heroes (TV)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, First Kiss, I wrote these in 2007, M/M, Short stories collection, Tippy Uploads Old Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-10-16
Updated: 2008-01-20
Packaged: 2020-09-19 06:48:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 30
Words: 88,895
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20326870
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tiptoe39/pseuds/tiptoe39
Summary: Thirty ways Matt and Mohinder could share their first kiss. Written in 2007.





	1. look over here / kocchi muite

**Author's Note:**

> I've decided to upload some old work to AO3. This was the first big fanfic project I ever did for a Western (non-anime) fandom.

"What are you doing?"

It was an accusation, not just a question, when Matt asked it; but the figure in the chair didn't move or turn to face him.

"I'm resting," the scientist responded in a tone drained of all inflection.

"Well. Don't let me disturb you. I'm just going to go over here and work on how we're going to **rescue our kid.**" Matt was pissy. But Mohinder wasn't biting.

After a few seconds of stony silence, Matt said, "You know, I can't believe you. How can you be resting? I've been on my feet all day trying to get everything we need to go to Philadelphia and find this guy, and I get home and you're _resting_?"

"Matt, I don't want to discuss this." Mohinder stood up abruptly, as though he was about to walk out of the room. "I am really tired of you ordering me around like I'm some sort of foot soldier. I'm just as worried about Molly as you are." He still wouldn't face him.

"Damn it, look over here when I'm talking to you!" Matt lunged forward grabbed his shoulders roughly, spinning him around.

"Get your hands off--" Mohinder started, but the words trailed into silence as he found himself a scant few inches from angry dark eyes and a furrowed brow.  
He felt his strength drain away. "I'm sorry," he said. "I'm just so tired..."

"We both are," Matt said, drawing him into a brief, friendly hug. "We just have to remember what we're fighting for, that's all."

Mohinder sighed, looking down at the odd diamond formed by the lines of their feet.

"What are you fighting for?" he said softly.

"What do you mean?" Matt said defensively. "I'm doing this for Molly. I've always been doing this for Molly."

"Maybe that's not enough for me anymore."

"What?" This was unforgivable; it was worse; it was treason. Was he saying he'd given up?

"Maybe this is about more than just Molly. This is about you and your father. I wish you'd just admit it."

"How I feel about my father has nothing to do with this."

"But it does!" Mohinder hissed, leaning in to him. "And denying it does you no good whatsoever. You're not objective in this, Matt, and neither am I. But at least I'm big enough to admit it."

"What are you talking about?" sputtered Matt. "As though you're not doing this for Molly."

"I'm not doing it _just_ for her," Mohinder said. "I'm doing it for you, as well."

"Well, I don't need your help."

"I'm not doing it because you need it. I'm doing it because I want to."

"Thanks, but no thanks," Matt grumbled, turning away.

Mohinder laid a hand on his shoulder. "Look over here when I'm talking to you." He was echoing Matt's remark, but when Mohinder said it, it was something quiet. A request, not a demand.

Matt turned but did not meet his eyes.

"You're Molly's family, and that makes you my family too," Mohinder said gently. "Of course I want to help you. The question is, do you want to help yourself? Or do you want to continue to just spin your wheels and be angry? Sooner or later you're going to have to face the fact that you'll be facing him."

Sighing, Matt nodded. "I know. I just don't see how you're going to help me with that."

The thick, dark eyelashes fluttered, and Mohinder gazed at him. A dark hand came to rest on Matt's shoulder, then his cheek. "I don't know, either. But I'm hoping that knowing you have a family here will help you deal with the loneliness. We care about you. ..._I_ care about you. Probably... more than you even know." When Matt's expression changed to one of surprise, Mohinder feared he'd said too much, and he quickly turned, his hand sliding from the other man's face.

Then his wrist was caught in a firm grip. "Look over here," Matt murmured, pulling Mohinder toward him and crushing him in an embrace. His lips touched Mohinder's forehead. It was just a natural expression of thanks and comfort and kinship. And then he exhaled, and Mohinder's face was tilting up toward him, and they were breathing into each other... and Matt found his lips on his eyelids, his cheek... Even when their lips touched and held, it felt perfectly natural. It wasn't until afterwards, when they stared at each other, contemplating the step they'd just taken, that it seemed at all like they'd done something odd.

"I just kissed you," Matt said.

"Astute observation," Mohinder half-smiled.

"Was... is that OK?" It wasn't the question he expected to ask.

"Do _you_ think it is?" Mohinder wasn't sure who this quietly smooth person was that had taken over his body and was replying so quickly. He certainly hadn't begun to process all of this.

"I think... I don't know if it _is..._ but I need it to be right now," Matt confessed. "I need you... to be my family until all this is over."

To Mohinder's amazement, the tough-guy cop who'd been yelling a few moments ago began to crumple, a flush creeping through his face until tears sparkled in his eyes. "I don't know if I'm going to have a family after this. I've already lost the only family I'd ever had... and to think that I could find my dad again but that he's Molly's nightmare... and now we don't know if we're going to lose her..."

"Don't talk like that." Mohinder pulled him into an embrace. "We're not going to lose her."

"I just... I can't do this alone. I can't lose you, too." Matt wasn't daring to hold him; his arms were still at his sides. "Please tell me that wasn't a huge mistake."

"Far from it." A soft laugh glowed just behind Mohinder's words as he felt soft tears staining his shoulder. "What you just did, I've wanted you to do for ages. So please don't worry about that." He felt Matt nod. "You're a brave man, Matthew Parkman. And a good one. Probably the best one I've ever met. If there is any justice in the world, it has to favor you." Now it was Mohinder's turn to kiss Matt's forehead gently.

"Come on," he said. "Let's go save our little girl. And then there will be plenty of time to talk about you and me."


	2. letter / otosata

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "It's not mine."

"It's not mine."

Those were the words Matt greeted Mohinder with as he came home.

"Sorry," Mohinder said, opening the fridge. He was famished. "What's not yours?"

"The baby."

Mohinder dropped the carton he'd just taken from the fridge. Leftover Chinese spilled everywhere.

"Oh, no." He crossed the room to where Matt sat, crumpled in his easy chair, and kneeled before him. "Are you all right?"

"Yeah." It was not a convincing tone of voice. "Just feels weird saying it out loud. It's not my baby. I'm not going to be a father after all."

_You already are one,_ Mohinder thought.

"That doesn't help!" Matt burst out.

"I know," Mohinder said softly. "That's why I didn't say it. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to think it."

"Yeah, and I didn't mean to read it," Matt grumbled. "It's all right."

"How did you find out?"

Matt waved a creased envelope. "She sent a copy of the results. In case I didn't believe her, I guess."

"I see." Mohinder put his hand on the folded paper. "May I?" Matt didn't resist. Scanning the page briefly, Mohinder nodded. "I see," he repeated.

"I mean," Matt said in a voice that betrayed no emotion but a sort of emptiness, "I didn't like the idea that I was going to have a kid I barely saw..."

Mohinder was silent. He couldn't think of a word to say. He was angry at Matt's ex-wife for being so impersonal. How heartless could she be, to just send a letter like that? She had to know him well enough to know he would be hurting! The depth of his rage surprised him, and his fists clenched to keep himself from shouting every last obscenity that was screaming through his mind.

"You know what's sick?" Matt thought. "Lately I have even caught myself wishing for this. I thought, Jesus, why do I have to go through this? She sleeps with another guy and I'm the one who gets kicked out? And now I've got to fly across the country to see my own kid? I actually wished it would turn out not to be mine."

He laughed bitterly. "I suppose wishes do come true. But only so that they feel like a kick in this ass."

"Don't say that," Mohinder broke in. "You know that's not true."

"Feels true right now." Matt got up, stomped around the apartment like a movie monster on a rampage. "But that's not the worst of it."

"It's not?" Mohinder would not have asked, except that he felt Matt wanted him to. He was obviously looking for a reason to articulate the sound and fury within him, and right now he needed someone to be there and give him a stage to strut and fret on.

"No." Matt looked at him almost plaintively. "The worst part is, I AM kind of glad. I feel like a load's off my shoulders. And at the same time I feel like a child of mine has died. Both! At once! How much sense does that make?"

Mohinder thought it made a lot of sense, but he didn't say so. And hopefully Matt wasn't listening.

"I mean, the rug's been yanked out from under me. I've been totally betrayed. But at the same time, I'm free!" He was almost hysterical, laughing and half-crying. "And all I can think about right now is how excited I am to spend all my time with this family. How happy I am that _that_ door is finally closed."

Then, in a movement so swift Mohinder barely saw it, Matt crossed the room and grasped both his shoulders. "I mean, you and Molly are all I have now!" And Mohinder could see the desperate loneliness behind his sparkling eyes. "Isn't that... great?" He couldn't sustain the manic smile. "Isn't it?"

Mohinder couldn't think of anything to say. He was a little frightened. Matt was in shock, and he'd been alone all evening stewing over this. Everything he'd been feeling had been amplified by this empty echo chamber of an apartment. It must be awful for a telepath to only have his own mind to read.

"Isn't it?" Matt repeated insistently, shaking Mohinder's shoulders. "Jesus--" And he doubled over, drained, crouching on the floor as though he'd been punched in the gut.

Instinctively, Mohinder flung his arms around him. "I'm here," he said soothingly. "It's all right. I'm here." And, not knowing what else to do, he began to sing a lullaby he remembered from his childhood. Molly loved that song; it calmed her after her nightmares awoke her. He prayed it would do the same for the man in his arms in the midst of his waking nightmare. Still humming, he lifted Matt's face and pressed his forehead against his own, willing him to feel the closeness and the calmness he was searching for. He closed his eyes.

Matt's eyes were wide open, though, and he was watching the movements of those lips, seeing Mohinder's face so clearly for what might be the first time at this short distance. Abruptly, he grabbed the tangle of dark curls in one hand. His mouth captured Mohinder's in mid-note.

The gently closed eyes flew open at once, and the beginning and end of a surprised murmur cut off the song. Their gazes met for just a fraction of a moment before the kiss deepened and Mohinder's eyes flutered closed again. He felt strong arms pushing him backward onto the rug and a bearlike brute of a body atop his. Despite himself, he reached out, pulled Matt closer, willing that this might provide him some small comfort. That it would let him know he deserved to be loved. Let him know he was loved.

When the moment had passed--and a long moment it was--Matt rose to his knees, red, and mumbled, "Sorry."

Mohinder sat up. "Don't be," he said. "I'm not."

"You're not?" Matt was not expecting this answer.

"No," Mohinder said soberly. "But I want you to know that you deserve this."

And he slapped him across the face.

Red now for more than one reason, Matt recoiled, grasped his cheek with one hand, and cursed. "What the hell was that for?" he roared.

"Several reasons," Mohinder said, getting up and dusting himself off. "You're acting like a crazy person, and you need to snap out of it, for one. Also, I get the distinct impression you want to be punished for feeling relieved, so I hope that does the trick, because you haven't done a single thing wrong, so nobody else is going to punish you. But finally, Matt--" and he pointed an accusatory finger at him-- "it was because what you did just now, you did because you needed some comfort. And next time, I expect you to do it because you need _me._"

And he turned on his heel and went back to the kitchen to clean up, leaving Matt to process yet another piece of unexpected news.


	3. jolt/yuru

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 'Don't tell me you can't take it.' Mohinder let out a little scream and shielded his face.

There was a big shag rug in front of the TV. Molly liked the feel of it, said it was like sitting in a field of grass. And Mohinder liked it too, though he only plunked down on it when he thought nobody was looking. Other times, he sat on the couch like a civilized person.

After driving Molly to soccer practice, Matt had spent the day hauling clothes back and forth from the laundry machines in the basement of the building. It was truly amazing how much laundry could accumulate among three people in the short space of a week, especially since one of them had to wear a uniform most of the time. When he got into the apartment, Mohinder was in front of the TV in his favorite spot, like a pet who always managed to find a patch of sunlight to settle in. Letting the hamper down with a loud grunt, Matt came to sit down next to him on the rug.

"What's on?" There was a TV ad for cola at the moment.

"Football."

"_Football_?"

"Can't I watch football?" Mohinder turned a quizzical eye on Matt, unsure of where the confusion lay.

"I just... can't imagine you'd be all that interested, that's all."

Mohinder shuffled his feet on the rug awkwardly. He was wearing, Matt noted, a pair of god-awful argyle socks. "At this point, I can't imagine I am, either," he admitted. "I suppose it would help if I understood at all what was going on."

"Oh, that I can help you with," Matt said, leaning back, his palms spread against the tousled rug. "They have four chances to go ten yards, and if they do it, they get another four chances to go another ten. That's the whole game, in a nutshell. Everything else is just details."

"Ah." Mohinder nodded. The game had returned to the screen. "And the knocking each other down, then, is a detail?" The look of half-disgust on his face made Matt laugh out loud.

"If you don't like it, watch something else?" He rocked forward onto his knees, reaching forward to hit the channel button.

That's when the first jolt came.

Matt's finger and the TV screen got a little too close, and a loud crack sounded. He withdrew his hand quickly. "Ow!"

"Static?"

Matt nodded. "Damn thing. How old _is_ that set, anyway?"

"Pretty old," Mohinder admitted. "I got it off Craigslist for forty dollars. It seemed like a good deal at the time."

"Yeah, well, hand me the remote, would you?" Matt was still nursing his shocked hand. "At least it has one."

Mohinder plucked the remote from the rug and handed it over. As Matt took it, his fingertips brushed against Mohinder's palm.

_Zap._

"Ouch!" Mohinder jerked back.

"Sorry."

"Perhaps it's not the TV," Mohinder accused. "Perhaps it's you."

"Me?" Matt looked offended. "Why would it be me?"

"You _have_ been folding laundry all day," his companion noted. "There's a lot of static electricity that gets built up when fabrics are--"

"Yeah, yeah, thanks, Mr. Science," Matt said, and pushed him slightly with the palm of one hand.

_Zap._

That time, they both jumped. "Stop that," Mohinder yelped.

"You stop it!"

"I'm not doing anything."

"Right," Matt sniffed. "I may not have a Ph.D., but I know at least that rubbing your socks on a rug like that is going to charge you up."

Mohinder's feet abruptly stopped their idle shuffling. "I hadn't realized--" he started, but then gave a wicked grin, and those garish socks started rubbing back and forth at double the pace.

"Oh, no you don't," said Matt, grabbing a fistful of sweaters from the hamper and rubbing them between his fists gleefully. The two men eyed each other for a moment, dangerous fingers outstretched like claws, and then a childish game of tag broke out. Mohinder jabbed at Matt-- zap!-- who grabbed his arm-- zap!-- and touched his ear-- zap!-- with another charged hand. Laughing and rubbing his feet along that now-high-voltage shag rug, Mohinder pulled free-- zap!-- and closed his grip around Matt's hand.

Matt tried to pull away, instead falling backwards onto the rug-- a flurry of small zaps rising from its charged strands of yarn-- inadvertently pulling Mohinder with him until he landed on all fours above the prone Matt-- zap!--

and the laughter stopped abruptly as the distance between them shrunk to nearly nothing. They were close enough, in fact, that tiny jolts of static electricity seemed to be jumping between the tips of their noses and swimming in their mingled breaths. The charge in the air was not all electric, though.

"That was ridiculous," Mohinder said, trying and failing to scowl.

"Yeah," breathed Matt. And unable to control the impulse, he put a hand to Mohinder's face.

_Zap!_

Mohinder crashed down onto him. They kissed long and hard, possessed by the electricity flowing between them, feeling their bodies buzz with its pulse. Matt wrapped his arms around the man above him, the static moving through his fingertips in a series of pleasant jolts, hands jumping with every shock. Mohinder's hands were in his hair-- which was surely now standing straight up, he was so full of static and sensation.

Their lips parted. Matt tried to say something but choked; Mohinder stuttered incoherently. His eyes were soft. Matt's were blazing.

Eventually, Mohinder's features broke into a gentle smile. Matt smiled back and tenderly touched his cheek with one hand.

_Zap!_

"Ouch!" Mohinder jumped up. "That one hurt!"

"Hah!" Springing to his knees, Matt rubbed his hands on the carpet threateningly. "Don't tell me you can't take it..." Mohinder let out a little scream and shielded his face.

"What are you two doing?"

Molly was standing in the doorway, soccer ball in hand, looking disgusted.

"Oh, ah, welcome home," stammered two red-faced supposed grown-ups.

"What are you, _eight_?" She rolled her eyes and walked away down the hall. They watched her go and glanced at each other nervously, unsure of how much had been seen.

"_She's_ eight," Mohinder finally said with a frown.

"Righhht," Matt drawled, getting to his feet. "I think I have a new target."

"I'm with you," Mohinder declared, grinning.

It was a long time until the laundry got put away that night.


	4. The distance between us, and that person/Kimi to boku no kyori to ano hito

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The screaming was worse than usual that night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wtf is with the arabian nights references? They wrote themselves in. Please don't blame me.

The screaming was worse than usual that night. "He's scared," she said as Matt patted down her sweaty brow and Mohinder put a glass of water into her shaking hands. "Someone's after him and he's scared. And when he's scared, he's scarier--"

Matt thought back to the Nakamura case and the symbol that had marked the businessman for death. The same symbol in Molly's drawings. Was it possible that the man in her dreams was being targeted by the killer, too? As he smoothed her hair, listening to Mohinder's whispers and her slowing breathing, he felt a rush of anger and cold bloodlust. Despite himself he wished that the two monsters would find and destroy each other.

Molly was calmer now, but she was still clutching her blanket with a white fist. "I don't want to go back to sleep," she said.

"Sweetheart, you have to," Mohinder cooed in his soft, soothing voice. "You've got school tomorrow."

"I can't. I'm really scared."

Mohinder kissed her forehead. "How about this," he said. "Why don't you come sleep in my bed right next to me. That way I'll be right there to protect you."

She looked up at him with round eyes. "Would that be OK?" she asked tentatively.

"Of course, sweetheart, that's why I said it."

Molly was visibly relieved. She nodded and swung her feet over the edge of the bed. "OK." She took Mohinder's hand and they walked together to the doorway. There she stopped, looked back, and said, staring at Matt, "You come too."

Mohinder started, but Matt nodded firmly. Anything for his little girl.

* * *

Once in Mohinder's bed, Molly enthusiastically hugged him around the waist, resting her head in his lap. Her hair was a bright orange spray against the flat gray span of his T-shirt. Matt sat on the edge of the bed, full of relief and affection at seeing her calmed and happy. He'd decided to wait here until she fell asleep, then sneak back to his room. So when her breathing deepened and slowed and her muscles relaxed, he shared a glance with Mohinder and whispered, "Good night." Leaning in to kiss the top of Molly's head, he squeezed her hand briefly.

Molly grabbed that hand and pulled. _Hard._

Matt toppled, falling onto the bed. Molly murmured happily in her sleep and hugged his hand close, seemingly unaware that she'd just taken him hostage. Matt goggled at her a moment, incredulous that he couldn't shake her grip, and then harrumphed as he settled down onto the bed. "She'll let go in a sec, I'm sure," he shrugged. "Geez. More powerful than a locomotive."

"That's our girl," Mohinder agreed. Both gazing at Molly, the two smiled in unison at the oddity of the situation. Here was the princess, the damsel in distress, surrounded by her protectors, blissfully sleeping away. And the two strong knights were her prisoners, powerless to move under the sway of her unconscious affection. It was quite the reversal of fortune.

"Yep," Matt whispered. "She sure is." Paternal pride welled up in him as he sat there, watching her. He knew she'd had real parents, people who'd given her life and raised her until their lives were stolen away. But at moments like this it was easy to forget that she wasn't his kid, that he and Molly and Mohinder weren't a real family, flush with love and compassion. She deserved a real family, and he wanted to give her one so badly-- and more selfishly, he wanted it for himself. He'd lost one family already, and this was the second chance he prayed, but doubted, he'd ever get.

Matt's eyes flickered up toward Mohinder, and the smile slid off his lips. He was suddenly, acutely aware of the distance between them. Somehow Molly managed to pull him into a supremely awkward position. He was a scant few inches from the line of Mohinder's shoulder, and were that face to angle down toward his, there would be an intimacy to the proximity that threatened to be embarrassing. A sudden lump of discomfort caught in his throat.

"I, uh, I guess it'll take another few minutes," he said. "She'll have to relax sooner or later."

Mohinder's head was leaned back against the headboard, his face tilted ceilingward. "Why don't you just go to sleep?" he said. "Go ahead. I don't mind."

Matt blushed hotly. "I can't sleep sitting up," he stammered. _And it's either that or lean on you,_ he added internally.

"Whatever you want," yawned Mohinder, "but just so you know, _my_ masculinity can take it. Good night." And his eyes closed.

Suddenly all alone in a bed full of people, Matt grumbled. "I can _take_ it. What does that mean?" Grudgingly, he relaxed his head onto Mohinder's shoulder, very gradually, as though something might leap out of his skin at the first contact. His head hovered, brushed, settled.  
  
The warmth of the man's skin was surprisingly comforting to Matt. Although still self-conscious, he felt the muscles in his neck relax and his sleepiness overpower him. When a yawn overtook him and he inhaled deeply, he felt Mohinder's scent suffusing him. It was something smoky and mysterious, like a perfume from a faraway kingdom where magic carpets flew. He let go of the breath only with regret.

* * *

Did they doze? Matt thought he had dreamed of a magic lamp and shifting sands. It was dark and they were still interlocked, three corners of a family triangle. But as his eyes adjusted to the barest slivers of light, Matt realized that something had changed. Mohinder was no longer leaning back. His head now dipped forward, his nose brushing Matt's cheek, and his lips, heavy and full, mere moments from Matt's skin.

And he was awake.

Matt's gaze flew up to read the dark eyes. They were soft, full of admiration and something else Matt couldn't or wouldn't dare name. He started slightly at the realization that a soft, warm hand was caressing his cheek. "What are you doing?" he whispered when he could find his tongue, trying to sound angry but succeeding only in conveying sleepy confusion.

The hand stopped moving but did not withdraw. "I was curious--" Mohinder could not finish his thought. The eye contact between them faltered, but did not fail.

All of a sudden the pounding of his heart was all Matt could hear. "She's still sleeping?" he heard himself say roughly. His mouth was dry.

"Who?" The slight pursing of the lips as the word slipped from between them was fascinating to Matt.

"Our daughter." They were so close, and Matt found that he, too, was curious.

"_Our_ daughter," Mohinder's lips twitched as he repeated the phrase. A long curtain of black eyelashes rippled as his gaze flickered downward. "Yes, she's sleeping."

Mohinder's hand on his face was warm, and it made him want to lean into that palm and fall asleep again. "Then why are _we_ awake?" he smiled.

There was no answer. Matt leaned on him again. In the darkness, their breath faded in and out of synchronicity, like melodies moving past each other in a fugue. It felt good to be there, quiet and together, a family. For a moment Matt was sure he'd fall asleep again, but it became obvious as time went on that Mohinder was still quite awake and was staring at him intently.

He sat back up, blinking at those eyes that were burning into him. "M-- Mohinder, what are you looking at?"

"The distance," he whispered after a moment.

"The distance?"

"How odd." A low chuckle sounded in his throat. "I've been trying to estimate the distance between us. I just now realized that's what I was trying to do. The mind can play tricks on you late at night."

This was something Matt was discovering himself. He was still staring at Mohinder's lips, finding himself possessed with an urge he could only explain by thinking he must be dreaming. It had something to do with that low-pitched laugh of his, the rumble of it deep within his chest, transferring over to Matt and filling him with vibration. It had something to do with the darkness and the lack of sleep. It had something to do with the girl who had found peace here in this place, and how grateful he was to Mohinder for providing that. And it had to do with Mohinder himself, this man whose presence and proximity seemed to captivate Matt, like he was a beacon on a lonely sea.

"Did you figure it out?" he asked stupidly. Why was he indulging this? It seemed dangerously close to veering out of control. At the last, the thrill running through him was like something he only ever felt in car chases and roller coasters.

"What?" Mohinder had not stopped staring.

"The distance. Between us." It was hard to breathe.

"No," Mohinder said, and somehow every time he spoke his breath was a little hotter, his face a little harder to focus on. "Perhaps two feet?"

"Nah, that's too much," Matt whispered, looking down his nose to view the gap. It was too small. And not small enough. Mohinder's hand on his face was now not just warm but hot. "More like six inches."

"Five..." Mohinder breathed.

"Maybe five." And five was fading to four. "Molly--"

"She's fine--"

"I think I'm going nuts," Matt groaned. "Are we dreaming?"

"Three inches, perhaps--" Mohinder's other hand came up to cup Matt's face.

"Two inches?" His eyes closed.

"Too much--" And they came together in a kiss at once feverish and calm, passionate and placid. A mystical kiss on the first of a thousand and one magical nights. Matt could feel the whoosh of the magic carpet as sensation lifted him up above the clouds.

It was only when Matt's hands rose to touch Mohinder's shoulders, then stroke his hair, that he realized Molly had released his hand long ago. Drawing back, he stared at it. "Huh." It was honestly the most intelligent thing he could think of to say.  
  
Mohinder's eyes just glittered at him.

"I guess that means... I should head back to my room now," he said lamely.

"You can do that... if you like," Mohinder said slowly, and Matt heard in his voice the same starstruck confusion he was feeling. Mohinder was just as lost, just as bewitched as he was. And that knowledge stirred up a sandstorm of emotion that stung his eyes with its intensity.

"Mohinder, I--" He wasn't sure what he was trying to say, but it hardly mattered-- he didn't get very far. Their lips met again before another word could slip between them. Matt broke into a grin against Mohinder's mouth, and his smile was answered.

This time it was too late; this time there would be no pretense. Matt simply leaned his head back against Mohinder's shoulder. And not because he had to.

And finally, all three of them slept.


	5. "Hey, you know..." / Ano sa...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I wish you had been there.

Mohinder was waiting at the precinct when Matt returned. He looked anxious, like he had something to say. Matt brought him into a spare conference room and shut the door. Mohinder's first words sounded over the click of the latch.

"Did you find him?"

"Yeah."

"And?"

"And... he got away."

"How the hell? How could you do that? How could you let him?"

"He... caught me by surprise. He did something to my mind. By the time I got out of it, he was gone."

Matt slumped into a chair, sighing heavily. Mohinder seemed to know enough not to press him. He paced, biting his lip.

It was Matt who broke the silence. "Hey, you know...?"

"What?"

"I didn't go alone."

"No?" Some surprise in his voice.

"No." Matt got up again with a groan - he was still sore from the tumbles and punches he took. "Did you ever meet Nathan Petrelli?"

To Matt's surprise, Mohinder flushed with anger. "You went with that guy? What the hell did he have to do with it?"

"He has skin in the game. His mother's in jail for what this killer has done."

"He was very rude to me the first time i met him," Mohinder sniffed defensively.

"Oh, and that's a cardinal sin." Matt rolled his eyes.

"Why are you defending him?"

"Why are you _attacking_ him?"

Mohinder wasn't entirely sure. "I'm not att-- I just said he was rude to me!"

"Right. Whatever." This bored Matt. Mohinder was acting like a jealous wife.

"Hey, you know..." This time it was Mohinder's turn to speak.

"What?"

"Molly's... at the Company."

Matt flew across the room, grabbing Mohinder by the shoulders. "What!? What the hell were you thinking?"

"They're the only people who are equipped to deal with what's happening to her." Still, he looked guilty as hell for saying it.

"Yeah, except for the fact that they kept her hostage for a year after her parents were killed."

"They were protecting her," Mohinder hissed. "Sylar was still out there, remember?"

"Riiight." Matt was beside himself. Which one of them was trying to bring these people down, anyway? "In exchange for using her to find the rest of us."

"As if you're any better."

"What?" The accusation hit Matt right between the eyes and like one who'd been slapped, he stumbled.

"You claim to be her protector," hissed Mohinder. "And yet you used her just as shamelessly as the Company did."

This stung. "Only so I could find the man who's been tormenting her!"

"You knew he would find out. You're a police officer. You could have used all the resources of the police department to find your father. But no, you had to make a little girl face her worst fears for you. And you won't even face the truth about what you've done. That's really brave, detective."

That stopped Matt cold. He remembered Janice excoriating him in the depths of his subconscious. Running from the truth seemed to be his specialty. It was all he could think to do since it had started leaking directly into his brain. Things he shouldn't know, he knew. And he wasn't even brave enough to face them.

But Mohinder had no special powers. Even surrounded by those who did, he was never afraid. How could Matt ever be half the man Mohinder was if he kept acting this way? Shame singed his heart.

"Hey, you know..."

"What?" Mohinder turned at the softness of Matt's voice.

"I wish you had been there." He wasn't looking at him.

"What? Why?" Mohinder took a step forward, confused.

"Maybe you could have... explained to him..." Matt shook his head. "I don't really have a reason. I just wish you could have been there. I feel like.. I might have been stronger if you were."

"You didn't ask," The words slipped out before Mohinder knew he was saying them.

Matt's eyebrows lifted. "You were so angry at me. You told me I had to go and you had to stay."

"I did," Mohinder corrected himself. "I couldn't think about leaving Molly alone."

"Neither could I."

"Then what did you mean, you wish I could have been there?"

"I don't know." Matt paced, "I was just thinking out loud, that's all."

"How considerate of you," Mohinder snapped, "considering that around you, I can't think any other way."

It was too much, Mohinder realized as Matt's face fell. He had spent so long burning up with anger that it hadn't occurred to him until just now, but he and Matt were in this together. This was a problem they were both facing, and instead of working together, they were playing a ridiculous game of one-upsmanship, of who could be the better parent. When Molly needed them both equally. He sighed.

"Hey, you know..." This time they both spoke at once.

Mohinder was faster to reply. "What?"

Matt hesitated, then went on. "I know why Molly's so scared of my father now."

"I'd think that'd be obvious." How easily the sarcasm slipped back into the conversation!

But Matt didn't pick up on it. "No, I didn't tell you, but... I know what it must be like for her now." He paced briefly, then came to where Mohinder was standing, leaning in toward him. "He's done something awful to her. He's trapped her inside her worst fears. He did the same to us."

Mohinder's brow furrowed. "But you got out."

It was almost surprising to hear. "Yeah. I did."

"How?"

A good question. "I don't know. I thought my way out, I think. I started looking at everything really hard, and then I realized it was Nathan I was hitting, not the guard... and then..."

"Guard?"

His gaze faltered and his voice slowed, as though he were re-entering that dream world. "I was in prison. I was in prison and Janice was there, and she said--"

Mohinder grabbed his shoulders and shook him. "Matt. Enough. We need to figure out how you got out."

"Right." Matt focused, thought hard. "I was able to talk to Nathan. In my mind."

This was a stunning development. "You were able to transmit a thought?"

"I think so. I kept yelling, but it didn't work. But then I yelled at him in my mind... and it was over."

Mohinder went rigid.

"What?"

"You got him out of it, too?" he asked insistently.

"Yeah."

His eyes were full of light. "We've got to get you to Molly."

"You think--"

"--you can bring her back? Yes, I do." He grabbed Matt's hand and tried to pull him toward the door.

Matt resisted. "But wait. I don't even know... Maybe I have to be inside, too... I've never tried..."

Mohinder sighed, turned, walked right up to him. "Snap out of it. We have a chance of getting our daughter back; we have to take it."

"You're right," sighed Matt. Then he twitched. "...Our daughter?" he asked incredulously.

Despite himself, Mohinder blushed. "Isn't she?"

He turned again toward the door, but again Matt stopped him. "What does that make us, then?"

In response, for the first time in the conversation, Mohinder smiled. And then, emboldened by something he couldn't explain, he faced Matt, touched his face, and kissed him tenderly. "We'll worry about that later," he said.

Matt's hand flew to his lips, his face red. "Y-yeah," he whispered. "Let's go."

They moved in silence through the office and out to the parking lot. It wasn't until they were outside, in the bitter October air, that Mohinder spoke again. "Thank you," he said. "You've given me a little hope for the first time."

"That's it," Matt said suddenly. "That's why I wished you were there." He grinned.

"What do you mean?" Mohinder unlocked the car and slipped inside.

Swinging into the car, Matt looked straight at him. "I mean, you give me hope," he said.

Mohinder smiled slightly. "Then we're even." He shifted the car into reverse and pulled out of the parking space, craning his neck to see behind him. As he shifted into drive, Matt's hand came to rest atop his. They shared a smile and drove away.  



	6. the space between dream and reality/yume to gen no aida

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In the dream, Matt smashes down the bedroom door.

In the dream, when Matt comes home, there's the smell of lasagna and a running hug from Molly, who's up far too late, and Mohinder is standing in the kitchen cleaning up. There are soap bubbles flying through the air and a huge grin on his face, because Molly has just said something incomprehensible but indescribably cute. His rich, chocolatey voice purrs out a "welcome home."

In reality, there's a note about leftovers in the fridge and having to work late, and Molly's put herself to bed, the poor kid.

In the dream, the phone rings and it's Matt, his voice like a puff of scented smoke over the line, asking is he OK? and does he need something or at least some company? and when is he coming home?

In reality, Mohinder works on soulless software uninterrupted until 3 a.m.

In the dream, when Matt's alarm clock goes off, there is a figure sprawled in a chair next to his bed. Mohinder has wandered in late last night and has checked on Molly, then him, and as he was contemplating just how much he cares about the man, sleep overtook him.

In reality, morning comes with cartoon sound effects and cereal bowl clinks and an 8-year-old who needs to be sent off to the bus, and while Mohinder _has_ come home, he's wiped out in his own bed, oblivious.

In the dream, Mohinder wakes up in time to walk Molly to the bus stop. Matt comes running down the sidewalk a minute later, just in time to hand Molly her lunch box. Watching her get on the bus and say hello to friends fills them with pride, and when Mohinder's hand slips into Matt's, he just smiles, and it all falls right into place.

In reality, Mohinder sleeps right through the morning routine and awakens to an empty apartment and a message on his cell phone from a pissed-off boss.

In the dream, when Officer Ingalls asks if he wouldn't mind strolling to the Java House to discuss the Rivers case, Matt can see right through it. And he sets her straight immmediately, telling her that he's _not_ interested and there _is_ someone else, thank you very much. And that afternoon he goes home to his family.

In reality, he can't think of a thing to say in return, and he orders a triple-shot mocha frappo because he feels so damned sorry for himself.

In the dream, when Mohinder wanders by and sees Matt deep in conversation with a young, attractive female cop, Matt senses his presence and looks up. And he panics and tears out of the coffeehouse at breakneck speed, chasing after him and confessing that it meant nothing, she was just giving him advice on how to win Mohinder's heart, because he's always loved him and couldn't get up the courage to say anything.

In reality, Matt doesn't see him, and Mohinder stomps on by, suddenly in a very foul mood.

In the dream, Mohinder isn't upset at him, or if he is, he brings the issue up in a casual way, or even seriously, but directly. Matt's able to set him straight on whatever it is, and the awkward moment passes.

In reality, Mohinder doesn't even say hello to him when he returns from work. He goes straight to the kitchen and starts frying up food with spices so hot that they almost seem intended to make Matt's eyes water. And he does not look him in the eye.

In the dream, Matt smashes down the bedroom door, or at least pounds on it, demanding to know what the problem is. And when Mohinder sends out the mental image and gives Matt the clear impression that yes, he _is_ jealous, well, that's when Matt DOES break down the door and cover him in kisses, swearing that he'll never make him hurt like that again, and if he'd only known how Mohinder felt...

In reality, Mohinder can hear him pacing outside, occasionally stopping in front of the door but never once having the courage to knock. And Mohinder is the one who has to open the door first.

In the dream, Mohinder speaks first, confessing that he's been so distant because he's been fighting these feelings for so long and he no longer knows how to contain them, and it's so hard to be around Matt and not tell him everything, all his secret, urgent desires and his ridiculous romantic fantasies. And Matt embraces him, and all of the hiding is finally, finally over with.

In reality, Mohinder simply asks him if he's seeing that lady cop he was with this afternoon. And Matt can only stumble over his own tongue and blurt out, "What if I am?"

In the dream, he continues, "But I'm not. She means nothing to me."

In the reality, Matt crosses his arms defensively, and Mohinder bites his lip to stop the tears from coming and looks away. "I'm glad there's someone you're interested in," he hears himself say.

In the dream, Matt says, "There is... but it's not who you think." And Mohinder looks up with glittering eyes and there is a moment of beautiful truth.

In reality, he's not nearly so suave, and he doesn't really know what he's doing as his body acts without him and he rushes forward clumsily, trapping Mohinder in an awkward embrace, unable to help himself. And Mohinder gives a little yelp and goes rigid but then is still, his hands in fists against Matt's chest.

In the dream, nothing more need be said.

In reality, Mohinder has to ask. "What are you doing?"

In the dream, the answer is in that first kiss, sweet and expressive.

In reality, Matt's words jumble together. "You're wrong, you're wrong. It's not like that. It's _you_. It's always you. It's always been you. I want _you._"

In the dream, Mohinder is smiling.

In reality, there are still tears in his eyes as he angles his face in for that first kiss.

And somewhere between the dream and reality, that first kiss happens.  



	7. Superstar

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's a little bonus at the end :)

"How come you can't see the stars from home?" Molly asked. The mosquitoes were making Swiss cheese out of her, Matt noted, but right now she didn't seem to mind, stretched out with her feet dipping off the picnic blanket into the cool, tall grass.

"There's too much light," Mohinder explained, coating a cracker with the last of the cheese and looking at it ravenously. "You know how, when you see a bright light after being in the dark, you can't see anything else for a moment? Well, with all the lights in the city, you can't see anything but those bright lights."

"But you can see buildings and stuff." Molly tilted her head backwards so she was an upside-down girl, chin on top, gazing at an inverted Mohinder popping an inverted cracker into his mouth.

"Yes, but you can't see things that are as far away as stars." He swallowed and sucked the salt from his fingers. "But here, there's no such light, so we can see many of them." He tweaked her nose, and she squeaked and faced upward again.

Matt knew nothing whatsoever about the stars, but he did know that he was glad they'd taken this trip. When the train stopped in this tiny Connecticut town, a sense of peace had settled over the three of them.

At first, he'd thought he would take Molly to Coney Island, someplace loud and lively like that, while Mohinder went on his Company errand. But she was sick of him constantly leaving them alone, and Matt had to admit he agreed. So they tagged along, for Molly's sake, he told himself, and not because he thrilled to the idea of a family holiday. Or a romantic setting with this man, whom he'd slowly come to realize he had a massive crush on. It had taken him a while to admit it to himself, but the feelings were unmistakable. It was getting hard to _breathe_ around him.

"Hey, Matt!" This time Molly had angled her head toward him. The girl liked being upside down. "I can see you in the stars!" She pointed up at the sky, the sleeve of her sweater dangling from that chicken bone of an arm. They were all tightly wrapped in layers tonight-- even with the unseasonably warm November days, the nights still carried a chill.

Mohinder laughed. "That's Orion," he said. "The Hunter."

"No, it's not." The girl shook her upside-down head emphatically. "It's Matt, the Policeman. Look, there's his police belt. One, two, three." She jabbed the little finger as if poking each of the stars from afar.

"Hm," Matt muttered under his breath, "if THAT's my belt, then what's that smudge down there?"

Mohinder heard, and he whapped him on the arm gently. "That's a _nebula_," he whispered, trying to suppress a smile.

"Oh, is that what the kids are calling it these days?" At that, Mohinder did laugh.

"What's so funny?" Molly asked.

"Nothing, nothing." Matt tousled her hair and turned to grin at Mohinder. But he was gazing at the heavens, and his profile under the stars was so breathtaking that Matt quickly returned his attention to his little girl. "So, does that make me a star, then?"

"It makes you a _constellation._" Now in full-blown teacher mode, Mohinder had switched subjects from astronomy to vocabulary.

"No." Molly would have none of this learning stuff. "It makes you a SUPERstar."

Matt was fairly sure he was glowing bright pink, even in the darkness.

"Ah--"

Mohinder had made a quiet, breathy noise in his throat. His face had lit up.

"What?" Molly sat up, looking over her shoulder at him.

"A shooting star." His voice was small, but the wonder in it was unmistakable.

"Really? Where?"

"Just there--" He pointed. "Just now."

If the sudden appearance of star-struck Mohinder weren't so fascinating, Matt might have chuckled at it. He had a feeling he was watching a young boy looking up at the darkening sky above an Indian plain, seeing a firebolt streak through the blue for the very first time.

Eventually, Mohinder noticed him looking. "I'm partial to meteors," he explained demurely, his eyes cast downward at the remains of their picnic. "I know there are billions of them every night, but they're so elusive. I can't help feeling fortunate when I see one. It's not that I believe in destiny, but... they make me think I must be in the right place at the right time."

"Maybe it fell over there," said Molly suddenly, jumping to her feet. "I'll go find it for you, Mohinder!" And off she ran, laughing, to the edge of the field, looking down the slope to where the waves were crashing against jagged jetties in a roaring rhythm.

"Don't go down there!" Matt called after her, then turned back to Mohinder. "Are there billions every night? Really?" Mohinder nodded. "I had no idea."

"Most of them are invisible to the human eye," said Mohinder. His smile was dazzling even in the dark. "But to be looking up at just that right moment, at just the right part of a sky this vast-- it seems so unlikely." There was more than just a trace of yearning in his voice. "And yet here we are."

"That was pretty unlikely, too," Matt said. Mohinder's eyes flew to his, and he had to look away. "I mean, would either of us have thought, six months ago, that we'd be here taking care of her?"

"And who would have thought that I'd ever meet any of the people my father was so eager to find? Yes, I suppose." He sighed wistfully. "I suppose that, all things considered, I really am quite fortunate."

"Yeah," said Matt, "me too." They sat in silence for a time-- listening only to the waves and to Molly's shrieks as she did cartwheels in the dark grass-- staring at the heavens together.

Then it happened. A streak of light, almost too quick to see, sliding across the dark canopy of the night like a glittering blade drawing a tight seam against taut fabric. It hung in the air for a spinning second and then faded out.

For a moment, they both stared, not breathing, and the space where it had been. Mohinder's hand had flown to Matt's at the first sight of it and was still there, squeezing tight. Matt's heart was doing jumping jacks.

Then Mohinder turned to face him, grinning ear to ear.

Matt did the only thing he could do. He raised a hand to touch Mohinder's beaming face and leaned in toward him. The last he saw before his eyes slitted closed was Mohinder's grin fading, his mouth becoming a round "O" of confusion and wonder. The instant their lips met, Matt thought he saw a bright star shining through his eyelids, whiting out the world.

Tasting the tenderness of the young man's lips, Matt felt his mental eye slip back into focus, and it was as if he could see the two of them, a pair of silhouettes against an even darker sky, their chins and necks making a heart shape that curved down and met its end where their hands were joined. The tentative sweetness of Mohinder's kiss was telling him volumes more than a simple scan of his mind ever could. Mohinder _cared_. He had been dreaming of this, too. He felt the same way. The knowledge of it was hesitant at first, and as it grew more solid, Matt smiled against the kiss and gathered the man in his arms, pressing that heart shape into oblivion, making them a single silhouette instead of a pair.

Molly had ceased playing and was now standing at the edge of the field, watching them. Matt didn't care. He was delirious with sheer joy. His feelings were answered. Of all the billions of stars out there, he'd managed to reach out his hand and catch the most precious one of all. It was enough to make a guy believe in destiny.

And when they parted, there were twin stars in Mohinder's eyes.

"I wasn't expecting that," he whispered, his voice trembling with something like awe.

"I--" Matt felt his voice catch. "I was just-- I had to--"

"Matt--"

"HERE I _COME_!"

The call sounded from far away, but by the time they turned, Molly was already halfway to them, charging at full speed across the meadow. She slammed into them both, arms widespread, bowling all three over into a rolling group hug on the picnic blanket. Mohinder burst out laughing, and Matt could only give a dumb "Whoa-oh-OH!" as he was tackled.

"I love you guys," Molly whispered into the hug. It wasn't just the two of them both hugging her this time-- it was a real group hug, each of them embracing both of the others. Matt's hand met Mohinder's on the small of Molly's back. Their eyes locked above her head, and they smiled two large, genuine, giddy smiles. Poised on the edge of a wonderful unknown something, hand in hand, like a pair of falling stars, they laughed into the night.

:end:

**BONUS FIC:**  
This is the first thing I thought of when I saw the prompt "Superstar"...

_"Everybody was... kung-fu fighting..."_

Matt felt like an idiot. How had he managed to down enough beer that he thought this was a good idea? Still, all eyes in the club were on him, and it seemed infinitely less cool to bolt (as he desperately wanted to) than to stick it out and keep screeching.

Abruptly, a thought cut through the clatter. A fellow (who looked distinctly _greenish_ in the light, and were those _horns?_) was staring at him intensely, practically shouting into his mind:

_Oh, for crap's sake, honey. Come out of the closet, already! He wants you too!_

Suddenly, Matt felt for all the world like a superstar.

:end:

yes, it's an Angel crossover... I need to be put down, I think. Oh dear.  



	8. Our Own World/futari no sekai

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mohinder had given Molly The Sims 2 for her birthday.

Matt was staring at himself. Albeit a pixelated, somewhat porkier version of himself. But it was definitely his face, and it was even wearing his boxers and undershirt. Sadly enough, it was drinking milk straight from the carton.

"Is that me?" He pointed to the screen.

"Mm-hm," Molly assented, bringing her cursor to the man on the screen. His name appeared in a bubble over his head: "Matt Paresh."

"What's Paresh?"

"It's yours and Mohinder's last names together. You can only give a family one last name."

Mohinder had given Molly The Sims 2 for her birthday. He'd spent a half-hour installing it, telling Matt he was making sure the characters couldn't Woo Hoo (whatever that meant) and that it was otherwise safe for a 9-year-old girl. Matt hadn't yet seen the game, but he took it as a compliment that Molly had wanted to replicate her real life in a game rather than creating some fictional superfamily. It meant she was comfortable here, he figured, but he didn't see how it made a very interesting game. "Is it fun?" he asked.

"Yeah," she chirped. "In the game, we're in our own world, where nobody can bother us." All of a sudden it made perfect sense, and Matt patted her head affectionately. He hoped someday soon she wouldn't have to play a game to get that sense of normality.

"So is that you?" he asked, pointing to a redheaded kid who was jumping up and down on the couch without end.

"Yeah."

"Where's Mohinder?"

"He's at work. He's only a lab assistant right now, but I think he will get a promotion if he keeps being on time to work."

Matt nodded. "That's the way to do it." He pointed to some symbols at the bottom of the screen. "What do those mean?"

"Those are your needs, like how comfortable you are or how hungry you are."

"Looks like I have to go to the bathroom."

"Hm, you're right. Good eye." She brought the camera around to where the bathroom was visible and clicked on the toilet. Matt watched in fascination.

"Guys don't do it like that."

He could practically hear her eyes rolling. "It's just a _game..._"

"So what are those things, then?" He pointed to a different item on the display.

"Those are your wants. Like that one means you want to play with me."

"What's the one with the lips?"

Completely casually. "Oh, you want to kiss Mohinder."

Matt straightened up. He knew he was either turning red or white, but he didn't know which. "I want to what?"

"Kiss him. That one means you want to flirt with him. And this one means you want to buy a TV."

"Molly?" He wasn't sure why he was asking this, because he _was_ sure he didn't want the answer. "Why do I want to k-kiss Mohinder?"

"Uh, I dunno, because you _like_ him?" Her voice was dripping with disdain, as though it should be perfectly obvious.

"Did you _make_ me like him--in the game?" The last three words were hastily added.

"No, you guys got along and then became best friends, and then he wanted to fall in love with you so I made him flirt with you, and you fell in love with him too." She explained it as though it made perfect sense, as though it weren't ridiculous in the least. "Oh, look, he's home." A car pulled up outside the virtual house and a familiar-looking man in a lab coat got out and walked to the door. Molly clicked on him and surveyed his needs. "He's tired," she noted. Matt just nodded, too thrown to pay much attention. Also, the virtual Mohinder was kind of frighteningly good-looking. He stared at the screen, trying to ponder what to make of this realization, until he realized that Molly had turned from the computer and was staring at him with a huge grin on her face.

"What?"

"Should I make you kiss him?" she asked eagerly.

Either a thousand ants had suddenly decided to crawl up his neck, or Matt was blushing furiously.

As if things couldn't get any worse, the apartment door clicked, heralding the arrival of the real Mohinder. He poked his head into the alcove where the computer sat. "I'm home," he said. "What are you doing?"

"Playing the Sims," Molly said innocently. Matt inwardly willed her to stop there, but there would be no such luck. "I was just about to make Matt kiss you."

"Oh!" Mohinder's eyebrows lifted, but he showed no real surprise or embarrassment. Then, to Matt's horror, he shared a wicked grin with Molly. "I guess I'd better beat him to the punch, then?"

And before Matt had a single chance to protest or question or even breathe, Mohinder was planting a wet one right on his lips. Molly shrieked with laughter. The kiss seemed to go on and on, and at the end, Mohinder leaned back and winked. "I'll be in my room," he said, "if you need anything." And he disappeared through the door again, but not before Matt heard him think, clearly and deliberately, _There is more where that came from._

His hand on his mouth, Matt stood blankly, staring at the empty space where Mohinder had been. Who exactly had turned the world upside down, anyway? And why did he desperately want to go chasing after Mohinder for something that was --- that _had_ to be-- just a prank?

He finally found control over his muscles and looked back at Molly. Her grin had been replaced by a small, knowing smile. "Well?" she said. "Go on! I'm just playing my games!"

Matt stared at her a second, and then he went.


	9. Dash

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You are denser than a black hole.

The form read, _The ___ household gives_ (and here "Molly" was scribbled in, in an eight-year-old's loopy cursive) _permission to visit the New York Museum of Modern Art on Tuesday, Nov. 20."_ (Molly had helpfully read it out loud to him last night.) There wasn't a lot of room in the blank.

"Just write Walker," Mohinder suggested as he walked by the kitchen table, carrying a half-dozen bulky books and a sheaf of papers.

Matt stared glumly at the permission slip, chin in the upturned palm of one hand. "But we're not the Walker household. She's the only one named Walker around here."

"Then use Parkman." Mohinder's voice sounded from the nearby closet. Apparently he had decided it was time for some late-fall spring cleaning, and was busy stuffing half his library into the space.

"But that's not HER name!" Matt complained.

"What does it matter?" Mohinder came over to look over his shoulder. "She's the only Molly in the class. They know whom you're talking about."

"Did you just use 'whom'?" Matt turned and squinted up at him.

Mohinder looked surprised. "What's wrong with that?"

"Nothing." Matt half-smiled. "Maybe I should say Parkman-Walker. You know, use a dash."

"A hyphen," Mohinder corrected.

"Now he's a proofreader." The remark was tossed out into the late-afternoon air. It was Indian summer and the window was open to let some of that perfect temperature into the dusty apartment. From below came the bustling sounds of a street festival, a welcome respite from the usual blare of traffic. The combination of the air and the noise was relaxing, and Matt's heart was unusually light. That, of course, had nothing to do with the fact that he and Mohinder had, completely independently of each other, decided to take days off, and they'd ended up going grocery shopping together and having lunch at a local sandwich place, chatting the whole time about Molly and their jobs and even their childhood a little. No. It was just the nice weather that was making him feel so good. "But then you're left off."

"Left off?" Mohinder had returned to his toting-and-dumping routine. By contrast, he had returned from the day's activities in a slightly foul mood; Matt had learned by now that one of his most reliable stress-busters was maniacal cleaning.

"Of the form. I can't fit all three of us."

"I'll live," Mohinder sighed. "Honestly, Matt, you're stressing out about a release form, for goodness' sake."

"I'm not stressing out. I'm just thinking out loud."

_And you're not defensive, either._

"Hey!" Matt got up, wheeled. "I just want to make sure the teachers know we are Molly's family. They sort of look at me funny when I go to pick her up."

Mohinder dumped another armload of books in the closet and turned back to face him, arms crossed, a sly smile on his lips. "There's probably a very good reason for that," he remarked.

"What?" Suddenly the cop was a deer in headlights. He turned pale, his mouth twitching nervously.

Mohinder walked toward him, backed him into the table. His hands came to land on the tabletop, on either side of Matt, effectively trapping him. "It has something to do with this," he said, locking eyes with the stunned ones staring at him.

Matt found himself leaning back, trying to widen the space between them. "With what? Mohinder, what are you--"

And then, like that, it was over. Mohinder sighed and walked away. "Nothing, never mind," he said, a bit of a dark flavor to his voice. _You are denser than a black hole._

Matt elected to ignore the mental comment. "Fine, what about Suresh-dash-Parkman, then? Or does that make us sound married?"

"What, you mean we aren't?" The dark edge was still in Mohinder's voice, even though the tone was casual.

"Ha, ha." Matt wished his heart hadn't done something rather funny against his ribcage when Mohinder said that. "I must have drank a lot that night in Vegas. Anyway. Suresh-dash-Parkman?"

"That's fine," called Mohinder from behind a pile of books, "but if that's the case what's wrong with just Parkman?"

"Um--" Matt couldn't remember his objection. "Maybe it should be Suresh-dash-Parkman-dash-Walker. But I don't think there's room for that..."

He was interrupted by a loud thud. The books had fallen to the floor in a pile, and Mohinder had come to the table and had taken the pen. He glared at Matt.

"You know what? You just don't want to write anything." His look was withering. "I'll write it." With a few scribbles, an tiny group of letters, joined by two dashes, was, improbably enough, fitting on the tiny blank. "Suresh. Dash. Parkman. Dash. Walker. There. All done." He slammed the pen down on the table and turned his back.

"What the--" Matt's jaw opened and closed dumbly a few times. "What's with you all of a sudden?"

The scientist whirled, looking daggers at him. "I'm tired of you making excuses for things you don't want to face!" he snapped. "I'm sorry our family situation makes you uncomfortable, Matt, truly I am, but this is where we are and I don't think it's going to change anytime soon, so I hope you get used to it."

"Uncomfortable?" Matt echoed. He wasn't sure where all this came from, but to be suddenly yelled at made him angry. "Why do you think I'm uncomfortable? Aren't you projecting a bit? Maybe you're the one who's uncomfortable, did you ever think of that? Wish you could be traveling the world and giving your lectures, if there wasn't a little girl here who needed you?"

Now the room was no longer comfortably warm but positively blazing with anger. "There is nowhere," Mohinder seethed, coming right up to him, "_nowhere_ I would rather be than here with Molly. How dare you accuse me of that?"

"I didn't accuse you of anything," Matt countered. His knuckles were white on the table. "You're the one who said I was making excuses. For what, huh? I'm here for that girl every day of my life, and you're always in Indonesia or Texas or somewhere else. Tell me, what is it that _I'm_ running away from?"

"From this!" Mohinder burst out. "From what's going on between the two of us, Matt. You can't tell me you haven't noticed."

Matt's pulse started straining against his chest again. His mouth felt dry. All of a sudden Mohinder's proximity was stifling him. "Between..." he began, but the urge to swallow seized him and he lost the words. Of course he'd noticed. He'd noticed at first objectively that Mohinder was brilliant, and that he was beautiful. Who wouldn't?

But then he'd noticed that his skin was warm to the touch, and that it was embarrassing to look at him when he'd just come from the shower, and that he blushed when they were in close quarters.

And then, after that, he'd noticed that he tried in vain not to lift his little finger when he drank tea, and that he wrinkled his nose when he was trying to solve a problem.

And that he had a wicked sense of humor.

And that he sometimes mumbled to himself in his sleep, in a language Matt didn't understand.

And that every thought he'd ever had (or, at least, every thought Matt had ever heard) was noble, generous, selfless, and wise.

And now Matt noticed that the anger in Mohinder's eyes had been replaced by sadness, and that he was thinking desperately, _Please don't break my heart._

"Mohinder. You're--"

"In love with you. Yes, I am." The eyes pleaded, but Matt, not knowing how to respond, did nothing. "I wish I wasn't. I wish this had never happened and we could just both be taking care of Molly as two friends. But I am, Matt. You know I am, and you know I've been silent about it." The old familiar flame flickered in his face. "But it is time to sort it out. Because I don't think I can live like this any longer."

"You're..." Matt repeated, trailing off. To say it would be to admit it was real.

And then Mohinder's hand was on his hand, a pleading touch. He thought he should draw away. He thought it wasn't a good thing to allow Mohinder to touch him like that. But all the thinking in the world wouldn't move his hand.

And then, with a shuffling step, they were nose to nose, and Mohinder's other hand was on his arm. And Matt forgot to control his tongue.

"...in love with... me?"

Mohinder nodded soberly.

It wasn't as though Matt intended to kiss him. But at two inches' distance, with gorgeous eyes staring straight into his, knowing that was love shining in their depths, something just felt incomplete. Like a dancer who is frozen in the midst of a leap. Gravity has to kick in, and something has to give.

The lips that brushed his own were slightly dry. Too many long nights in a lab, too much coffee, too little action. But they tingled where they touched, and suddenly they were an oasis on the edge of the desert sands. Matt had to go deeper, to quench his thirst. He pulled Mohinder into an embrace, arms across his shoulders and hips, tasting him with the tip of his tongue, feeling heat crush him from without, balloon in him from within. The hands on his arms had come up to wind across his shoulders and thread through his hair. Matt couldn't think. He was tasting an intoxicating nectar, and mindlessly, he wanted more. More.

When there was no more air to breathe between them, they stood tangled together, staring at each other, gasping.

Matt's eyes were wide. His mind was reeling. That had been one hell of a kiss. An epic kiss. They might write legends about that kiss someday. And it had been with Mohinder. _With a guy, with a guy_, whispered little gremlins in his brain. And when he thought about it that way, he panicked a little. But when he went back to thinking of it as Mohinder, it was all right. More than all right. Epic.

"I--" he started. Mohinder's eyes glittered with fear and hope. "I don't think I've ever had anyone kiss me like that," he said, blushing lamely. "Phew. I need a drink." This was pathetic, beyond pathetic. This is how he responded to his friend, his co-parent, after a confession of love?

"I'll give you some time to think about it," Mohinder said quietly, and he turned toward the doorway, where his coat hung on a hook. Matt felt beyond inadequate. Ashamed, he looked away.

His eyes fell onto the permission slip. It was the same jumble of letters and numbers, swimming around, inside-out and upside-down, that it always was. That anything was. But there was a small island of stability in that great sea this time, an island of compact letters anchored by two tiny, horizontal lines. He could read it perfectly.

Suresh dash Parkman dash Walker.

His family's name.

Mohinder was halfway out the door when Matt grabbed him. This time, he intended to kiss him. And this time, too, it was epic.  



	10. #10/10ban

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 10 Ways to Tell If Your Guy Friend Wants to Be More Than Friends

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which tiptoe39 proves that she has missed her calling and should write dumb articles for teen magazines.

"It's a proud moment in our lives," Mohinder announced as he and Molly came in the door. "Our little girl has bought her very first teen magazine."

"Uh-oh," Matt said. "I hope it's appropriate?"

"I did have a look before allowing her to buy it, yes." Mohinder rolled his eyes. The magazine was covered with photos of fresh-faced girls and exuberant headlines in bright colors, and it seemed to have replaced Molly's face in that prominent spot above her neck. "Ooh," came a voice from behind the pages.

"What are you reading about, pumpkin?" Matt strode over, peeked behind the magazine to make sure there was still a girl there. He wished he had X-ray vision to see if the girl still had a brain.

"10 Ways to Tell If Your Guy Friend Wants to Be More Than Friends," she announced.

"What guy friend are you talking about?" Matt looked suddenly shocked. "Do you know anything about this?" He looked up at Mohinder.

("Number One. He goes to you when he needs to know something," Molly read aloud. "Guys usually go to their guy friends for help with school and home. If he's asking you a question, it's because he wants an excuse to talk to you.")

"Don't look at me," Mohinder shrugged, grinning. "I just bought the magazine."

"Right. When she runs away to stalk some High School Musical star and starts wearing makeup to the dinner table, it's your fault."

Molly sat down at the table and kept reading, to herself this time.

("Number Two: He blames you for everything that goes wrong in his life. It's annoying, but that means he thinks you're an important part of his life.")

"Oh, I nearly forgot," Mohinder said. "They were selling these little-- bobbleheads, I think they're called? You put them on the end of your pencil. I thought it might make you smile when you have all that paperwork to do." He rummaged in his pocket and brought out a tiny plastic policeman on the end of a coil of wire. "Consider it an early Christmas present. Or a late birthday present."

("Number Three: He gives you little gifts. We're not talking roses and flowers, here. But if he has something for you, it means he is thinking about you even when you're not there.")

"It's cute." Matt took the trinket. "Thanks. Although we do a lot of our reports by computer these days..."

"Ah." Mohinder's face fell slightly.

"No, it's nice of you," Matt said. "I'll definitely keep it around. I'll put it next to that weird rock you found, the one that looks like an M shape." He moved into the pantry and opened the refrigerator.

Mohinder followed him. "You still have that? I'd forgotten all about it."

("Number Four: He keeps your gifts. You might have thought it was just a little something, but to him, it's a lot more.")

"You want a sandwich or something?" Matt asked, rummaging through the fridge. "Looks like we have some smoked turkey left."

"Have you learned to eat healthy overnight, then?" Mohinder raised an eyebrow.

In answer, Matt raised a wrapped cut of pastrami. "I'm talking about for you, dumbass."

"Right. Sure, then." Mohinder flipped open a magazine he'd bought for himself. "Why not. But would you mind putting a little..."

"...honey mustard on it, right?"

("Number Five: He remembers your likes and dislikes. Guys change what they like from day to day. So to keep in mind what you like is a huge stretch for him. It shows he cares.")

"This is fascinating," Mohinder murmured, flipping a page after licking the mustard off his fingers. For whatever reason, he and Matt had elected to stay in the pantry, just leaning against the counters as they ate.

"What's it about?" said Matt through a biteful of pastrami sandwich.

"Oh, nothing you'd care about," Mohinder dismissed it. "Just some neurological studies. How people intuit other people's moods. It's all synapses and seratonin."

Matt came over, looked over his shoulder. "It sounds kind of like me. Maybe I just have too many synapses and that's why I can read minds."

"It's a novel theory," Mohinder laughed.

"No, seriously," Matt insisted. "It sounds interesting. Really, the way we understand each other just has to do with a bunch of chemicals?"

("Number Six: He shows an interest in what you're interested in. If Mr. Football is suddenly showing up at the school plays, it could be he's discovered his inner drama king. Or he could just want to play Romeo to your Juliet.")

"I-- I don't know about _just,_" Mohinder said, blushing a little. "It may be that there's more to it than that, but the chemicals are the way our brains send the m-message."

"You just stuttered," Matt observed.

"I-- I did?" Mohinder looked up from the page, and his blush deepened at Matt's incisive stare. "I just did it again, didn't I?" He brought a hand to his mouth.

"That's really funny," Matt grinned. "I don't think I've ever heard you stutter before."

("Number Seven," Molly read, wandering over to the couch and diving onto it headfirst. "He acts a little dumber or a little smarter than he used to. He feels self-conscious around you, because he's just realized his gal pal is actually a gal. So the way he acts around you might change, just a little.")

"I used to. As a child. Just a little bit. But I learned that in order to get my father's attention, I needed to speak quickly," Mohinder admitted. "So I got over it very quickly. Still, it slips out sometimes."

"How did you get over it?" Matt said with a touch of envy. "I wish I could figure out how to get over my problem."

"There _are_ methods for managing dyslexia," Mohinder noted. "If you like, I'm happy to help you find some. All you need to do is ask." He patted Matt's hand a few times, and then abruptly became aware of what he was doing and looked up, his eyes locking with Matt's. His hand fell onto the counter, but the edge of his little finger was still grazing Matt's skin.

("Number Eight: He finds ways to touch you." Molly giggled herself silly at that one before reading on. "Now we're not talking hugs and kisses, here-- you wouldn't need our help figuring him out if that's what he was doing. But a slap on the back, even a 'Guess Who' with his hands on your eyes... they're hints that he wants to make with the snuggling next time.")

Matt managed to speak first. "Geez, Mohinder, someone could get the wrong idea." His face was beet red, but he was smiling.

"What? People will say we're in love?" Mohinder grinned back.

"Hell, half the parents of the kids in Molly's class think we are already." Matt's heart was in his throat and flapping like a hummingbird, but he managed to keep his calm.

"Well, not to overuse my daily quota of song titles, but let's give them something to talk about," Mohinder raised his eyebrows suggestively, but he was still grinning.

(Molly sighed dreamily as she went on. "Number Nine: He tells you so. Some guys will joke about dating you, but what he's really doing is testing the waters. How would you react if he was serious? That's what he wants to know.")

"Mm-hm. And if I said OK?" Matt could keep this up as long as he could; he wouldn't be the first to crack.

"I'd say, who are you and what have you done with Matt Parkman?" Mohinder smiled, but he turned away, and in that moment, there was a moment of clarity like a thunderclap in Matt's mind.

(Molly whispered, rather than spoke, the last one. "Number Ten: You like him, too.")

"But it is me," Matt heard himself say. "And I'm saying OK."

Mohinder stopped. He turned a few degrees. Then a few more, eyes on the floor. Then, daring to look up, facing Matt, seeing his fists clenched and his face pale. The whisper barely left his lips. "Are you serious?"

Matt nodded stiffly. "I can't believe I'm saying this," he said hoarsely. "But yeah, I think I am."

"But--" Mohinder took a step forward and then stopped. "We were just joking around just now--"

"I know, I know we were," said Matt. "But I don't think we really were. That is, I don't think I really was."

Another step forward. Eyes to the ground, then locking with Matt's again, a hint of a smile on the face. And a demure voice. "No. I don't think I really was, either."

("Believe it or not, if you have started to like your guy friend, more likely than not the feeling is mutual. Love doesn't just happen to one person; it happens between two people. So if you think there's something there, don't just look for the signs. Make the first move, and even if you haven't won his heart yet, you might just start to melt him by telling him how you feel.")

Matt stretched out a hand. Mohinder took it. Slowly, like dancers, they drew together. The hand on Mohinder's face was warm but trembling. He thought he might melt into it like so much brown sugar on a flame. Two pulses beat in his ears.

Was it himself or Mohinder who thought it? Maybe it was both. But the thought, the last thought before their lips met, was _This is really happening._ And then it really was. And there was joy, so much joy in that kiss that Matt wasn't sure he hadn't learned to fly. Because he felt absolutely weightless. As for Mohinder, he thought back to the article he'd been reading and marveled at its real-life application. In that moment he knew, without a doubt, that he'd always wanted this; and he knew as well that Matt had felt the same way.

("Hmm. I like Number Ten best," Molly said, and skipped down the hall to her room.)

:end:  



	11. gardenia/kuchinashi no hana

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is the moment I fall absolutely and irrevocably in love with Molly Walker.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please remember that each of these kisses is in a different world/continuity. In this one, I decided Matt had been in the closet all his life. I often see fics where Mohinder is out but Matt has to be persuaded, and I thought I'd take a different tack, just to see where it went. Next one will probably be different.

Hurts...

Hurts a lot. Don't want to be awake.

* * *

Hurts less now. I could open my eyes--

Busy place. Doctors. Doctors?

"Hello?"

"It's over. You're all done."

"What? Where am I?"

"You're in post-op. You're going to be fine."

"Fine?" Oh, that's right, I was shot.

I was shot. I was SHOT!

"Settle down, Officer. Settle down."

"Right, sorry."

Voices in my head. Crowded here.

No, I wasn't shot. I shot. But then Sylar.

SYLAR! Oh, shit!

"Officer Parkman, please calm down. You're going to be fine."

"I am?"

"Your friend took your daughter home for the night. We're going to take you up to your room pretty soon. You'll see them both in the morning."

My daughter? Who...?

Friend? Bennet? Ted?

What about Janice--

Maybe I'll just relax...

* * *

Different smell. Kind of hurting a little more now. Sunlight behind my eyelids.

It's bright. How long have I had my eyes closed?

This is kind of a nice room. It has a nice smell... it's those flowers. They smell incredible. God, look at how clean and white they are. Like hospital sheets. Who would have sent me such gorgeous flowers? Janice? Is she even bothering with me? Does she even know?

It must be her. I don't know anyone else...

There are footsteps in the hall, a child's footsteps. Fast. A child is running. I wonder, if I strain a bit to the side, if I can see him--

Ouch. No, that was a mistake.

But those footsteps are entering my room...! There's a small hand on my hand!

"Officer Parkman, you're awake!"

Molly.

I'm looking into the face of an eight-year-old girl who's crying herself sick with relief, tears in her hair and on her freckles, and she's clutching my hand like a lifetline, sniffling and whimpering. Her little lip is quivering. "You're awake, you're gonna be OK, you're gonna be OK!"

And then I wonder if those bullets punctured straight through me, because right now my heart is so full of air and light that I think I am going to go up out of my hospital bed like a balloon and just float through the ceiling.

This is the moment I fall absolutely and irrevocably in love with Molly Walker.

And then I notice who's behind her.

At first I think it's a woman. There are beautiful, delicate curls of hair and full lips and glittering eyes. And is that skin what they call olive? It looks like marble. Or something. It's a beautiful color.

But no, there's the faintest trace of stubble on the face, and the lines of the body are straight and strong. It's a man. An uncommonly beautiful man.

I know him. I've seen him before. He's the doctor who was with Molly at that place. Where I was just before I--

My chest hurts all of a sudden. I withdraw my hand and clasp at where the pain is.

"Are you all right? Are you all right?" Molly is shouting as though I'm not right there.

I fight down the pain and smile at her. "Hello, pumpkin," I whisper, though getting the breath to speak is a chore. "Nice to see you."

She starts wibbling again. The man behind her, the uncommonly beautiful man-- is that how I am going to think of him from now on?-- smiles. He has a hell of a smile. I feel kind of melty. Then again, that could be the drugs. Things are swimming a little bit right now.

"She's been waiting to see you all morning," he said. His voice is like British royalty. Like he stepped out of one of these art flicks Janice likes to watch. Where is Janice, anyway? Hasn't anyone told her where I am? I could really use a visit from her.

"Call my wife," I whisper.

"I think they have already." No, honestly, I don't think I've ever heard that accent outside of a video. I wasn't even that sure that real people talked like that. I thought maybe it was made up for the movies. "I can call the police officer who is on duty downstairs. I think he might know."

"No, wait." It's Molly who stops him as he turns to the door. "Don't go yet. He just woke up. He'll get lonely."

"Then you can stay with him, sweetheart." The man pats her head tenderly. I feel a little jealous. He's touching the girl I'm currently madly in love with. Worse, she's giving HIM the huge puppy dog eyes. If I could move, I might come to blows with this guy. A duel to the death for the affections of a third-grader.

"No, it's all right," I say instead. "Stick around."

Molly yays like this is the best thing she's ever heard. I chuckle and immediately regret it. Ow.

"Did you see the flowers? Aren't they pretty? Doctor Suresh says they're gardenias. I picked them out." She runs to the other side of the bed and grabs the vase to show me. The man starts after her, afraid she's going to spill them onto the floor, but her grasp is sure.

"They're beautiful, thank you," I croak, but all I can feel is disappointed that they're not from Janice.

* * *

She _does_ arrive, later that evening. She comes running into the room still carrying her suitcase. I'm half asleep. "Oh my God, Matt, thank God," she fusses, ruffling my hair, kissing my forehead. I murmur. I'm pleased she's here. It's a familiar voice, familiar thoughts in my head. I know I'm half-addled with drugs, and that helps, too. It all sounds like dim music. Her face is blurry, but it's familiar. The dullness of her presence is soothing against the sharp bright whiteness of the gardenias. They never seem to go out of focus, even when my eyes are closed.

* * *

In the morning, I wake up a little more, and we talk. She's mad at me for going off on some secret mission. "I'm sorry," I keep saying, but I'm not sorry. I felt I had to do this. For my marriage, our child, our safety. I had to.

(Of course, in the end, I didn't. In the end, I protected Molly. What else could I do?)

The doctors tell me it'll be about six weeks until I'm able to go home. They have to keep X-raying me and CAT scanning me and checking to make sure my organs are all working right, and it's a good thing I am a policeman because it's gonna cost my insurance a lot. Janice seems more annoyed at all this than anything. She says to me, "Of course I'll stay as long as I can. I may have to do some work from here, though. I was just barely sliding onto the partnership track..." She rolls her eyes. How inconsiderate of me to go and get shot when she was going to make partner in four years. God knows how the inconvenience of maternity leave will affect her.

And yet, when I say, "You can go, I'll be all right," she's annoyed that I don't need her more. I can't win.

Molly comes by that afternoon with her favorite doctor in tow. Janice looks surprised-- and kind of horrified-- to see a strange man and girl in her husband's hospital room, bringing fresh flowers, no less. But Molly is polite and tells her, with sparkling eyes: "You're Officer Parkman's wife? He saved my life, you know." She's about to elaborate on just how many times when Dr. Suresh sees the look of panic on my face and grabs her outstretched hand before the three fingers can pop up. Molly gets the hint and ends with a charming "He's my _hero._"

Janice smiles sweetly. "Yes, he's my hero, too." She's lying, but what are you gonna do. It's cute, even though it's obvious they're sizing each other up.

The doctor and I share a glance. Apparently he finds it as disturbingly cute as I do. I think I like him. (He's taking care of Molly, so I damn well better.)

* * *

When I wake up one morning, Dr. Suresh is replacing the gardenias in the vase with another fresh bouquet. I watch his hands as they arrange the stems. He's very methodical. It's not until he sees me looking and smiles briefly before returning to the arranging that I realize Janice never brought me any flowers.

* * *

She's calling clients from the hospital room. Things about depositions and stipulations. It's sort of ironic. She keeps letting little annoyed thoughts slip about not wanting to be here, but she's mortally wounded if I should give her the idea that it's OK to go. She's a little disturbed by the frequency with which Molly comes to see me. "Doesn't she have school?" she whispers. Then, one day, she thinks, _And I know that Indian guy isn't her father. Where are her parents?!_

I snap: "Her parents are dead. They were murdered. By the same guy responsible for what happened to me. 'That Indian guy' is all she's got right now, so leave her alone."

Janice stares at me in shock. "Stop reading my mind!" she demands. As though I can help it. I'm having enough trouble controlling my bladder these days, much less my brain.

Still, she goes on with _What kind of parents wouldn't have some sort of plan for who would take care of her, an aunt or an uncle or a grandparent or something?_ I think about trying to explain to her that Molly's not just a girl but a highly prized human tracking system who's being hunted down by crazed killers and evil corporations, but it's a little over her head.

That's probably the issue. I've stumbled into a world that's over her head, and I can't ever go back to where I was before.

_We_ can never go back.

* * *

It's a week and a half of this before the truth comes out. And I think she thinks I'm sleeping, or she might never have let it slip. But I'm not, and she does.

_Have to wait till he's out of here to serve the papers-- pain in the ass-- looks too heartless if I divorce him while he's in the hospital. Awful timing. Held hostage by a marriage that's already over..._

I keep pretending to sleep. I tell myself it's on purpose, but really, I'm just so horrified I can't move.

* * *

I wait until the next day. When she doesn't have any more clients to call and we're sitting there alone and silent for an hour and a half.

"You should go back to California," I say.

She looks at me with all the usual mock outrage. "What?"

"You have to keep your eye on your health," I say. "You know, the sonograms and all that."

"Oh." She shifts and looks away, and I can't divine her thoughts. "Yes, but--"

"Besides," I say, "we're through anyhow, aren't we?"

She stares at me, and I see the tears prickle in her eyes. I haven't got the strength to cry.

She comes over to the bed, holds my hand, all of a sudden the soul of compassion. "You know something, Matt?" she says sadly. "I really thought you were something when we met. Here I was, this kid just out of high school, and you were in the police academy, for Christ's sake. Every girl's dream, right? A man in uniform." She laughs bitterly. "And I was so screwed up, but you'd been there and gotten out, and I thought you were a godsend. Add to that how much our mothers were shocked we'd dare marry outside our religions, and you were a teenage rebel's perfect match.

"But then I started getting my own life together, and I went back to school and got my law degree, and all of a sudden you weren't interested. It was like you wanted a stray cat to take care of, not a wife, and you were disappointed that I passed by you."

She's thought about this. She's thought about it a lot. The one thing she's missing is the reason I was so disappointed-- the reason I wanted her to begin with. Now that I think about it, I'm very ashamed of it. She deserves better than someone who hates himself so much--hates his inability to read correctly, to move ahead in life, even to be attracted to the right people--that he marries the first woman he finds who's having a shittier time than he is. "I don't know, Jan. I haven't been a very good husband. I could never quite figure out what you needed, you know? And then, all of a sudden, I could hear everything you wanted... and it didn't help."

She nods, biting her lip. The urge to comfort her is strong. "Look," I say. "This doesn't change anything as far as the baby is concerned. I'll still be there for our kid, no matter what--"

Then the other shoe drops. And it's not even that I hear the words-- I just know. With the same ironclad certainty that she does.

"Oh, my God."

"I kept waiting for the right time to tell you." Her tears are flowing now. My eyes are wet, too, and my wounds are aching. It's getting hard to breathe.

"Oh, God." It's all I can say. I'm dying of grief. Grief and pain.

How did it come to this?

* * *

Over the next two weeks, we work out the details. We've kept our bank accounts separate, so the money isn't much of an issue. The one thing she's taken from me that I want back was never really mine to begin with, so what's the use of the rest of it, anyway?

My spots of light during these weeks are Molly's visits. She's been enrolled in school in for the second half of the year, she says. This is great, because she's been out of school since her parents' death and her subsequent illness. I doubt the Company cared much for her education. As long as her ability was intact, that's all they needed to invest in.

Every time she comes, she brings a new bouquet. Always the same kind of flowers. Sometimes Dr. Suresh comes by alone. "Molly would have my hide if I didn't at least keep them fresh," he says with a dazzling smile. His teeth are impeccable. What a thing for me to notice. Teeth.

He's not anxious to talk without Molly present, but in the days after Janice leaves I'm lonely and need someone. I ask him what kind of medicine he practices, and he laughs and says he's not that kind of doctor. Turns out that while he has a medical degree, his primary focus is genetic research, and Molly is his only real patient. "So you're studying her?" I ask, kind of accusingly. I don't like the idea of her being victim, patient, and then, to top it all off, guinea pig.

"To an extent, yes," he says. "I did a lot of work on her in the few weeks following her recovery, mostly to track the efficacy of the vaccine. But my interest is in finding others like her, helping them understand what's happening to them. This was the work my father pursued until his death, and I'm doing my best to carry on his research."

"And what _is_ happening to them?"

"It varies by person," he says. His face is animated. "In many cases, it's an ability to generate a physical phenomenon or manipulate matter; in others, it's an unexplained capacity for aggregating and processing information. That's the case with Molly."

"And with me," I muse. His eyebrows go up, but he says nothing, not yet. I hear him think, _I would have thought it'd be physical, what with his occupation, but I suppose there's no predicting._ I don't let him know I can hear his surprise.

Here's the thing: I'm laid up. And when TV is no good, I amuse myself with hearing the thoughts of the people around me. It's a guilty pleasure. Most of the nurses think I'm a fairly nice guy, so there's not a lot of excitement there. But sometimes they are thinking about something at home, or something they've seen at work, and it's a little like watching reality TV. I was particularly amused early on to hear one nurse, upon seeing Janice go by, think, _Frigid bitch. You don't begin to deserve him._ I'm not sure I agree, but I'm amused.

So that's my rationale for not telling him what I can do. Besides, what difference would it make? He's just some doctor who brings Molly by; I'll probably never see him again after I leave here. That makes me feel kind of sad, though: It means that someday I will be waking up and there will be no gardenias there to greet me.

* * *

When the divorce is finalized, it's nearly Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving in a hospital sucks. There's no two ways about it. Not that I've really ever had a strong tradition to compare it with. Smoked turkey with Mom and her spinster sister, that's my best memory from childhood. I'm kind of depressed that day, though, sort of lost in myself, and I'm actually surprised when Dr. Suresh comes by with an enthusiastic Molly. He's carrying another bright white bouquet under his arm, and more importantly, his hands are clutching two swollen brown paper bags, both of which are moist from heat and giving off an amazing smell.

"Happy Thanksgiving, Officer Parkman!" Molly comes over to the bed, climbs up on the chair, and plants a kiss on my cheek. My heart goes soaring, right through the window and down the street along with the giant Macy's parade balloons. All of a sudden this is my favorite holiday of the year.

We eat turkey and stuffing and talk. Molly has stopped calling Dr. Suresh by his last name and is now using his first name, Mohinder. It's an interesting name. I don't think I've known anybody of Indian descent very well, so I've definitely never heard it before. It could just be the Indian John Smith, for all I know. But when Molly says it, it sounds like some delicious nonsense from a fairy tale. Jabberwocky, Kumbaya, Rumplestiltskin, and Mohinder.

It's estimated that I'll be able to go home in a week. I've recovered fairly quickly. The nurses whisper that it's probably thanks to Molly's devotion. (They also are under the impression that I've left my wife for another man-- a certain other man. Which cracks me up, because I'm fairly sure Dr. Suresh is only here under duress. An eight-year-old duress, a duress in a dress, even.)

Between bites of biscuits, he asks, "Do you have plans for your discharge?" I shake my head. I figure I'll have to fly out to California, clear my stuff out of the house, look for an apartment somewhere, and start all over again. When I mention returning to the West Coast, however, Molly gets up. Her little shoulders are shaking with anger.

"You can't go away!" she cries. "You've got to stay and protect me. You can stay with us! We have room!"

A little taken aback, I laugh shakily. "That's very nice of you, pumpkin, but I'm sure Doctor Suresh has got..."

"No," he blurts out. "You're absolutely welcome. We'd love to have you." I can hear his mind racing. _What on earth have I just said? I must have gone mad._

"Mohinder!" She's all puppy dog eyes and big smiles again.

"It's fine," I protest.

For whatever reason, he's gone manic. His words and thoughts are all jumbled up, but I think I'm hearing what he's saying out loud. "The truth is, I've been meaning to do some traveling. I've been invited to speak several places about my research, but I haven't been able to leave her. If you were, for instance, available to take care of her, that might free me up, so it would be very helpful." Inexplicably, he thinks, _It might even be better if I were to stay away._ I don't know what that's about.

"You absolutely have to," Molly emphasizes, nodding her head as if she is the Great and Powerful Oz. She has absolutely owned my heart from the day she came in here, and now is no exception. Besides, where else do I have to go? I might not yet be well enough to travel, and it would suck to go straight from a hospital to a crappy hotel.

"I don't really have a place to stay in the short term," I mutter.

"Then it's decided." Dr. Suresh smiles. "I'll move my work into the living room and get a new bedframe for that room. Aren't you glad, sweetheart?" He puts both his hands on Molly's shoulders and smiles down at her. She tilts her chin up to beam back.

"Are you sure?" I crack. "I hear I snore."

"Oh, great." Molly rolls her eyes. "He can sleep through anything, but I might need some earplugs." I grin at her, but I'm distracted by the thought that runs through Doctor Suresh's mind, and I gawk at him a little. Did he just think something about temptation under his roof? Because if that's the case, he and I might have something else in common.

Molly clasps her little hands as if about to pray. "This is the best Thanksgiving ever. Dear God, I am thankful for being alive, and having good food to eat, and mostly I am thankful for you bringing me two new heroes who are going to be my new parents."

Doctor Suresh and I start in unison. He finds his tongue quicker than I can. "Molly, darling, you know we can't be your parents. We never can." He strokes her hair, and I'm sort of hypnotized by the motion. It's the same gentle motion of his hands that I see when he's arranging the gardenias. Deft, but at the same time loving. I feel like I could stare at them all day.

I'm a little worried about this. Granted, times are different than they were when I was a kid, but I'd already convinced myself that I was not going in this direction. Shit like this could happen to other people, but it wasn't going to happen to me. I was not going to be one of that ten percent. I'd already decided that. But here I am, fifteen years later, and I've tried marriage and it hasn't worked, and am I really so lonely that I'm ready to go back to that? It's not worth thinking about.

Besides, Molly has more to say. "I know you're not my real parents," she says. "But I think they'd like this. I think they like it when I'm with both of you. Because I know they're watching, and I know that when I'm here I sort of feel like I did when I was with them." Her eyes are getting a little misty, and I want to get out of bed and hug her tight. I can't move that fast quite yet, though. What's more, she's now come over to me and has taken both my hands. "So promise me you'll come stay with us, Officer Parkman. OK?"

God, she's such a treasure. "If I'm going to live with you," I tell her, "you'd better learn to call me Matt."

"Matt!" She's grinning and crying all at once and leaps onto my lap, and I'm very thankful that I didn't get shot in my legs because she is a big girl. I oof a little when she squeezes me and she backs off. "Sorry."

"It's OK." I kiss her forehead. Now that the shock is worn off, I think this might be a dream come true.

"And now you have to call him Mohinder too!" she says, suddenly. "Because now we're going to be a family."

I balk, but he walks over to the bed, completing the trio. "Welcome to the family, Matt," he says, holding out his hand.

I shake it firmly. "Pleasure to be here, Mohinder," I grin. The name sounds even more fantastical when I say it.

* * *

Molly's in a food coma, and we're flipping channels during halftime when something occurs to me that is long overdue. "Doctor S... I mean, Mohinder," I say. "There's something I need to tell you. Something you ought to know before I officially move in."

He turns to me, puzzled. He thinks so fast it's hard to keep track of it all. "Of course. What is it?"

"It's... what I can do." I look at the ground, the walls, anywhere but those huge dark eyes. The breath seems jagged going in and the words sound just as shaky coming out. "Since I'm invading your physical space, I think you ought to know that, well, your mental space may not be so safe."

"Meaning what, exactly?" Concern flickers across his face. I can see it out of the corner of my eye even while avoiding looking directly at him.

"Meaning I can read your mind. Not just yours. I can read minds, in general. And sometimes I do without meaning to. So I just want to say I'm sorry in advance for invading your privacy. I'll try not to."

He sits in silence for a moment. I try to avoid looking into his head, filling my brain with the police trivia I've been studying in the hopes that I can get back to work soon after I'm discharged. But after a moment of staring, he bursts out, "Fascinating!"

A cartoon scientist's word. I laugh. "I'm, uh, glad you think so. I think."

_So can you hear this?_

"Yeah, yeah, I can." How did I know he was going to do that?

And from his mind, just as exuberant as he'd said it aloud: _Fascinating!_ "This is actually quite good luck, you know," he says, leaning toward me. "Molly's started to have some nightmares. I'm unsure why, but they're increasing in severity and she won't talk to me about them."

"Say no more," I answer. "I'll see what I can figure out."

He looks relieved. "I am glad you're coming to stay with us," he says. It's such a forthright emotion that I don't even know how to respond. He's completely sincere. I don't think I've known anybody that honest my whole life. It's a little hard to take, actually.

Unsure why, I blurt out: "Also? Um. I can't read too well."

He stops. "Oh. Well. I read far too much, so perhaps we're even." It's about the best response I've ever gotten from anyone I've confessed that to. I feel a sort of wave of warmth rush over me. Then Molly murmurs in her sleep, and I am giddy with happiness. This couldn't get any better.

And then it does. His thoughts have started to spin in circles. _Hope he can't read everything... must get away from here soon. Perhaps to Milan, or Cairo... Too much temptation..._ And if that weren't enough, the kicker comes through clean and clear. _He is such a good man, and I haven't felt this way about anyone in ages, but I mustn't scare him._

And it's his certainty, his lack of fear of it, that gives me a little courage. And as we sit there in silence, watching TV, I gaze at him and gaze at myself in my mind's eye until I know without a shadow of a doubt, that it is time to stop running from it, it is time to come home and be who I am, and damn the consequences. Because I can see something just beyond the horizon that threatens to make sense of my whole life. When was the last time my life made sense?

Thanksgiving is definitely my favorite holiday of the year.

* * *

In my dream, Molly is running through a field of gardenias and Mohinder and I are on a picnic blanket watching her. Her dress is as clean and white as the flowers and she is laughing, and so are we, and I kiss those dark fingers that reach toward my face, and then the dream is completely different and we are on a black bed dotted with white petals and then I wake up with wet hospital sheets and a big throbbing hummingbird in my throat and thoughts in my head that I have successfully kept down since high school and even with all that a sort of peaceful feeling, like the que sera sera song, that things are moving in a good direction. Even with the door open only a crack, the gardenias catch the scant light like reflectors on a highway and wink at me. They know.

* * *

They're roses for a change when Molly hands them to me as they wheel me downstairs and load me into the taxi. They're burnished pink and nearly orange, and they're beautiful but unfamiliar. I am starting to be nervous. My stuff is on its way, and I've gotten a letter of recommendation from my ex-boss to present to the NYPD. But so much is in transition right now that I'm unsure what's going to happen.

In the taxi Molly chatters happily about getting ready for Christmas, and Mohinder looks vaguely uncomfortable. "I don't know a thing about these traditions," he says, "so I'm really going to need your help."

I wrinkle my brow. "We're going to have to figure out how to let her know I'm Jewish," I whisper. He stares for a moment and then bursts out laughing. Molly looks at us as though we've lost our minds.

The apartment is the top floor of a four-floor walkup. It looks like I'll be shedding those hospital-food pounds out of sheer necessity. Mohinder helps me upstairs, slinging my arm around his shoulder, and I remember the dream and blush. He seems oblivious, though, and Molly is just excited. When we get to the door, Molly says I should close my eyes. When I open them, I'm treated to a round table decked out with a chocolate cake and "Welcome Home" in blue frosting. There's confetti and a shiny tablecloth and party hats that don't match, and I can see the subtle decorating hand of an eight-year-old who's been given free rein in a party store. The rest of the apartment seems nice, although the wood is unvarnished and the bookshelves are dusty. It's definitely a place a guy could hang his hat. Best of all, and I don't even know why I like this, the roof slopes down in the alcove where Molly's bed is. I feel like I'm about to be living in somebody's grandmother's attic, and that makes me happy.

We eat cake and laugh. Molly goes to watch TV. Mohinder picks up my small overnight bag, everything I brought with me when I got to this city, and motions to me that we should go down the hall. I realize I haven't yet seen where I'll be sleeping. I'm sure it'll be small. He did say it was his study, and the desk that I saw in the living room wasn't all that big.

I follow him to the doorway. At this part of the hall, I can flatten my palm against the ceiling by stretching my hand up. But the door is at least big enough to fit through, and Mohinder pops my suitcase inside and then brushes his hands together briskly as though clearing them of dust. "I hope it'll do," he says. I peek past the door, which opens outward, counterintuitively enough, so I have to back up before I can enter. I see his face flickering with nerves, and I hear him thinking, _Please let this be OK._ I wonder what he's so worried about. He's the one extending charity to me, here. Beggars can't be choosers.

The room is small, but it's tidy and white. The sheets on the bed are new, and there's a small window to let air and light in. There are shelves that look newly braced to the walls, and an old set of dresser drawers. A small rug sits at the foot of the bed.

And on the nightstand there is a vase full of beautiful, ivory gardenias.

"Welcome home," he says quietly.

This is the moment I fall absolutely, irrevocably in love with Mohinder Suresh.

I go over to hug him and end up kissing him instead.

:end:


	12. in a good mood/gokigen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He's giving me a look that means a very specific thing when someone of the opposite sex does it. Especially in one's bedroom late at night.

These are the things I've noticed about Matt Parkman.

When Matt Parkman's in a good mood he whistles. If you can call it whistling. It's barely a tone, and when it is a tone, it's the wrong tone. I think that was supposed to be Somewhere Over the Rainbow the other day, but it sounded more like Happy Birthday. (As for me, I hum.)

When Matt's in a foul mood, he broods. Full-on James Dean antihero brooding, with a dark face and hunched shoulders and stony even-if-I-talked-about-it-you'd-never-understand silence. Which is slightly ridiculous, because he always does talk about it, eventually. Usually once a beer is down and we are sacked out on the couch (me) and the easy chair (him) exhausted from our days. And usually that's how he gets over it.

When he's feeling silly, he fixes Molly a Clown Sandwich, an open-face bologna sandwich with dots of ketchup in a smiley face on the bologna and the lettuce sticking up on the other piece of bread like a dunce cap. More than once she's rolled her eyes, saying she's too old for such things, but he sticks his tongue out at her and says, "Well, I like doing it, so what do you care?" I think he likes the sticking his tongue out part infinitely more than making the sandwich.

When he's managed to get what he calls "a great collar," he sweeps through the room like a pageant winner in a ticker-tape parade. Molly's four feet in the air all of a sudden and I often have to dive for whatever toy (or, worse, plate full of food) she's carrying to save it. I know immediately that bedtime will not be easy coming, because there will be ice cream following dinner. But halfway through the night, the seriousness of what he's faced will suddenly hit him, and he will feel the need to become the most affectionate father in existence. Molly often has to calm him down. I'm not even in the picture.

Sometimes I envy their closeness. As much as I try, I'll never be a father to Molly. I can be her friend, I can be her doctor, but I don't have that intangible connection that he manages so effortlessly. As much as I love her and want to protect her, I am simply the landlord here.

Now I'm the one in a foul mood.

_And when you're in a foul mood, you scowl and look like a pissed-off bullfrog._

Oh, for the love of...

He's been doing that every so often lately. I suppose he's just like any other kid with a new toy; for the first few weeks you want to use it constantly. Still, I wish he hadn't peeked in just now. This is not the most attractive part of my psyche, I'm sure.

_For what it's worth, Molly definitely thinks of you as a father._

I stand up. "Stop it! Do you mind?"

_You're thinking so loud I can't sleep. Go to sleep already._

If only I could.

_Do you need to talk about something?_

No. Yes. I don't know. But I don't want to do it telepathically.

_I'll be right there._

The creak of bedsprings across the hall, the floorboards squeaking, and then my door opening and his figure in it. His hair is every which way and he is scruffy with end-of-the-day sleepiness. The very picture of a working dad. As for me, I've got my desk light and my reading glasses on, and I'm sitting on my bed surrounded by a stack of scientific journals, very busy not reading any of them. I probably look like an oversized college student.

"You look like a professor to me. Funny 'bout that," he says, pulling up my desk chair and sitting down heavily. "So what's eating you?"

"You've been in my mind for the past hour, you tell me," I grumble.

"Ribbit," he said.

"_What?_"

"You look like a bullfrog again."

"Did you come in here just to make fun of me?"

"No." He clears his throat. "Sorry."

I sigh.

"You know something, Mohinder?" he says, leaning forward. "You really wear your moods on your sleeve."

"_I_ do?" This makes me choke a bit in surprise, and I cough, pound my chest with a fist, and straighten up.

"Yeah." He leans back in the chair, puts his hands behind his head casually. "Like right now. You want to look angry, but you're really just pouting. You don't like being made fun of."

I push my glasses back on my nose. "Oh, really?" I wonder if he is aware he's mocking me on a deeper level. After all, I had just spent 10 precious minutes of my life pondering his various moods.

"And you act all snooty when you're embarrassed." His grin is wide and easy, and I think he probably isn't aware of anything after all. He's not a simpleminded man, but he doesn't worry about those deeper layers of things when he doesn't have to.

"You're wrong there," he says. "I'm up sometimes at night trying to work through things. Figure out what's going on behind what's going on. It can be draining. But the fact is, you're not too hard to figure out."

Perhaps I was wrong. Perhaps he is simpleminded after all.

He laughs. "Sorry, man, but it's not me, it's you. For a brilliant scientist, you're pretty ordinary."

I heave a long sigh. "Right. Is there something you are trying to say to me?"

"Not in particular," he grins. "But now you've got me thinking. Do you know how defensive you get sometimes?"

"I do not get defensive."

"I rest my case."

I want to throw his "case" out a window. "What is your point?"

"No point. Just that you're easy to read."

"'So lay off of you? I'm sorry, Matt, but I have a perfect right to think what I think. It's not my fault that you can't control your ability well enough to tune me out."

"Whoa! Whoa!" He leans back, tipping the chair onto its hind legs. "Sorry, sorry. I take it back. What I meant to say was, you're _fun_ to read."

I sputter again. "And that's so much better?"

"Well, yeah. Like, when you're frustrated at work and you come home late and your brain is wrapped around some puzzle? I don't need to read your mind, because you walk around muttering."

"I do not!"

"You're being defensive again. I have heard you-- and Molly has too-- tell the dishwasher it can go hang itself. And one time--" he's tripping over his words, he's laughing so hard-- "your coat wouldn't stay on the hanger and you shook your finger at it and said, 'I'm well aware of the conspiracy!'" His imitation of my tone is frighteningly dead-on.

Despite myself, I have to smile. "In my defense, my coat and that hanger have been conspiring for months against me. I have wiretaps in place."

He raised his eyebrows. "See, that's what I'm talking about," he says. "Fun."

I freeze over again. "Right. Look, didn't you come in here to listen to my troubles? Or is this part of the free psychoanalysis?"

"Sure, Doc," he says. "Lemme have it. You're worried Molly doesn't think of you as a father, right?"

"And you said I was wrong." All of a sudden I feel like a frightened boy. I want to hole up in the corner of my bed and build a fortress of magazines around me. That's just what I need: a smartass cop playing on my insecurities late at night.

"Well, you are wrong." His voice is soft all of a sudden, and he turns pink, even in the yellow light of the desk lamp. "It's cute, actually. I forget what it was, but something recently made her think, and I quote, 'Best. Dads. Ever.'"

I lean forward. My heart has started vibrating. "Really?"

"Mm-hm." He nods. "And for what it's worth, Mohinder... I think of you as her dad too."

This makes me blush. Probably because he's leaning forward and gazing at me so intensely, and his eyes are so serious and focused. I'm uncomfortable with scrutiny of any sort, even the positive sort. This is the personality type of a scientist. You study others; others don't study you.

His gaze is absolutely withering. I have to get the conversation started again. "Um. So." I fiddle with my glasses, take them off, put them back on again. "I suppose, then, that you can feel free to go back to bed. That was all very comforting to hear, thank you very much for listening, good night."

"You're doing it again." He's still staring, but his mouth has curved upwards into a sly smile. If I were a stool pigeon under a white-hot spotlight, I could not feel more put upon. "Why are you nervous?"

Because he's giving me a look that means a very specific thing when someone of the opposite sex does it. Especially in one's bedroom late at night. I hope he didn't hear that. "I'm not nervous. I'm just tired. Good night."

"You are nervous," he says, and inexplicably, he gets up from the chair and sits on the other end of the bed. "What's up, man? You're thinking so fast I can't even understand you."

_That's_ a good thing. "I suppose I just am wondering how else I wear my, what was it? Moods on my sleeve."

"Oh, well, that's easy." His eyes lose their focus, thank goodness, but now they are looking right through me, almost dreamy. "When you're preoccupied, you bump into things. And not just when you're really preoccupied - you could be looking at a magazine that came in the mail, and you'll still collide with every chair in the kitchen on your way to the couch. I kinda hope you don't bruise too easily."

I sort of do, actually. I learned a long time ago not to wonder where my bruises came from; someone could breathe on me and I would bruise. I must look like a victim of domestic abuse sometimes. "Tell me I do something that's not completely embarrassing," I plead.

"Well, there's when you're in a good mood."

"Right. What am I like then?"

"You hum, for one. You've got kind of a nice humming voice. Me, I don't dare hum, so I just whistle." This line of thought seems familiar. "And you look at everything like you're seeing it for the first time. Does the world turn colors for you when you're happy or something?"

"No." But sometimes I'm sure the colors are brighter.

"And you do a _lot_ of smiling."

I realize I'm smiling right now. I purse my lips. "Sorry."

"No, it's cool. It lights up the whole room, actually." This from the man whose grin is illuminating everything right now. "When you're in a good mood, it's hard for me not to be. I get--" and he looks down at his hands suddenly "--I get kind of excited about it. Like my heart does--"

He stops. Tongue-tied for the first time tonight, I see.

"Thanks," I say. "That is nice to hear."

_Irresistible._

It's just barely a whisper. "What?"

He looks up at me. His cheeks are flaming red. "When you're in a good mood. It's... irresistible."

_Not it. You._

"Matt, I can hear you."

_It makes me want to reach over and--_

There's panic on his face. "I know. I'm not trying-- it's just happening--"

_\--I want to hold you--_

Now I'm panicking too. "I'm sorry," I stammer. "If-- If I could block it out..." I put my hands on my ears, but that hardly helps.

_\--I want to touch you--_

And we're both staring at each other; the speakers are on overflow, pouring his thoughts into my head. They won't stop. It won't stop...

_It makes me want to kiss you and that scares the hell out of me but it's so contagious when you smile and I just feel good when I'm around you and I want you so, so badly sometimes, that I forget where I am, I forget **who** I am..._

And he's on his knees now on the bed, crawling over to me. He looks possessed. I can hear him hearing his pulse beating in his throat. The sound is so loud.

_ When you are in a good mood, I realize I'm falling in love with you and I don't know how to handle it..._

And I can smell him now because he's pinned me against the wall and those eyes are boring through me like drills, and I can't move, I can barely breathe...

_Oh God PLEASE say I can kiss you..._

Before I know what I'm doing, my hands are on his collar and I've yanked him downward and he _is_ kissing me. And I'm kissing him. And it is phenomenal. His lips are soft and warm like a fireplace on a cold night, and his hands feel so big on my shoulder, and I think I might just melt. And there is this sensation of being complete. It's as if I have finally found the final piece to a puzzle I've been working on all my life. And it makes me want to sing.

So I hum instead. Right into the kiss, I hum. And he breaks into giggles against my mouth. _You must be in a good mood,_ he thinks into my head.

_Funny, that._ I wrap my arms around his shoulders. This feels good, more than good, it feels _right_. I feel like I've come home. I feel like I've been waiting for this. And pictures of him whistling and laughing and playing are filling my head, and I know now that everything he was thinking, I was thinking too, and we were like satellites reflecting and amplifying the same thoughts off each other. No wonder the feedback was overwhelming.

He was thinking I was irresistible when I was in a good mood, and I was thinking the same about him.

He wanted to hold me, touch me, and I wanted him to.

He is falling in love with me, and heaven help me, I'm madly in love with him...

And right now, he's looking at me, and he's pondering the exact phenomenon I am. Our minds are mirrors that face each other, and I can see reflections of myself into infinity.

He sleeps in my bed that night. And in the morning, I catch him whistling and he catches me humming, and we both smile.

:end:


	13. too many chains/yokei na kisari

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We've got magic to do, just for you; we've got miracle plays to play...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Spoilers through 2x03 and for the entire musical "Pippin." Really, the Pippin spoilers are worse than the Heroes spoilers.

When Mohinder was sixteen, his father was on a lecture tour in Britain. This was back when there was some hope that he might find a modicum of acceptance in the scientific community for his unconventional theories, and it was right at the peak of Mohinder’s admiration for his father, so he insisted on tagging along. Chandra was proud of how well his son was emulating him, and he wanted to encourage this behavior, so he did not object. Only Mohinder’s mother was opposed to the idea, but she might as well have not been in the picture at all. It was Suresh Senior and Junior, the scientist and his eager apprentice, taking the world by storm.

One night on that tour, Chandra took his teenage son to the West End to see a show. The musical was “Pippin,” and Mohinder was enthralled by it. This was the 1970s, when anything sleek and avant-garde was all the rage, and the musical was done unlike any show he’d yet seen. It was all jazz hands and black leotards juxtaposed with knights and castles, and they actually sang and danced, even tap-danced, about war and violence and death and then sex-- not even love but gratuitous sex-- and stress and suicide, and about the inability of a young man to find himself.

Mohinder probably was not the only one there who thought he was just like the show’s title character, but he was convinced, sitting there in the dress circle, that this play had been written just for him. In Pippin he saw a young man, gangly, awkward, just discovering what it was to be more than a boy. A boy with a father who dreamed of his son following in his footsteps, but who could barely rein in the dreams that flew wildly through his head. And a boy whose loneliness, like his ambition, was profound.

Pippin’s Act One anthem, “Corner of the Sky,” became Mohinder’s theme music. He hummed it when he was angry and distraught, when he was trying to concentrate, when he needed to tune out the world. It brought him through high school and college and medical school and his first love and his first job. He believed in the promise of the song, that one day he’d find the place where he could not only be comfortable but achieve his fullest potential. He didn’t want to be chained down to anything. He wanted free rein to dance across the heavens in infinite knowledge and freedom.

_* I've got to be where my spirit can run free, got to find my corner of the sky *_

Chandra’s theories were growing stranger by the year, but that didn’t faze Mohinder, who had grown up always chasing that shadow. But after his tenure was revoked by the university, after he was forced to start using the family’s money to maintain the equipment for his research, the same skepticism that had made Mohinder such a brilliant student began to seep into his feelings about his father. It was a horrible time for him, and he went to bed at night besieged by doubts, tossing and turning and fearing for his own sanity and his father’s. But Chandra was a lion in the laboratory, charging to and fro with vials of blood and markers for his numerous whiteboards, on which were scrawled chemical compounds and mathematical formulae in an anxious hand. As time went on, he began to look less and less like a genius and more and more like a mad scientist.

There were some knock-down, drag-out arguments in those days, and the last straw came when Mohinder shouted, “I used to think you were brilliant. But you’re just mad. You’ve just been stupidly lucky all these years to have gotten away with it all. But I can see through it now. I won’t be a part of this any longer.”That same week, Chandra packed up and flew off to the United States.

And then the news came of his father’s death, and Mohinder’s grief knew no bounds, not of country, not of time or space. He had to see it for himself. Not knowing what he would find, he flew across the globe, the stinging regret of his last words to his father in his heart.

_* Blood is red as sunset; blood is warmer than wine-- the taste of salty summer brine*_

In the second act of "Pippin," after the erstwhile hero has gone to war and lived a life of selfish hedonism and finally supplanted his father as ruler and achieved what ordinary men would assume is greatness, he falls prey to what Mohinder, as a teenager, saw as the most insidious of evils: domesticity. And after running across the world, encountering people with extraordinary abilities, seeing what was very nearly the apocalypse, Mohinder sometimes wondered how he'd fallen into the same trap.

Not that it was Molly's fault. Molly was wonderful, sweet, patient, always giving her all, even when the virus was ravaging her immune system and sapping her strength. But after Kirby Plaza, struck by the outpouring of bravery and humanity in that moment of crisis, Mohinder had seen his little girl's eyes when her hero was injured, and he had done what he thought was the only decent thing: He extended his hand and his home to a man who had no place to go and nobody but the little girl who trusted him so-- even though, Mohinder thought selfishly, she was _his_ little girl, not Matt's.

All at once, his life was no longer solely his own. There was always someone in his space, using his dishes without washing them afterwards, snoring loudly late at night when Mohinder was trying to read, pinking his laundry. The very sight of him got under his skin. Matt was so very normal-- even though Mohinder knew that wasn't entirely the case-- and so very good at all the things Mohinder wasn't: sitting patiently, maintaining a schedule, showing interest in things that nobody male or over the age of ten could possibly care about. And at the same time, he was no good at all the things Mohinder needed him to be good at. Filling out forms. Finding the right words to answer a child's innocent but delicate question. Cooking balanced meals. Helping with homework. He was almost as useless as he was irritating.

And all of a sudden, there were domestic concerns. The hot water had to be conserved in the morning. The grocery shopping needed doing. The garbage needed to go out. Mohinder felt a little like Gulliver, tied down in the land of Lilliput. A million tiny chains were about his body, none of them very strong. But the sheer number of them rendered him motionless as a corpse.

_* Oh, give me my chance, and give me my wings, and don't make me think about everyday things! *_

It was well into the new year when the phone call came. It was from Navid, a colleague and close friend of his father's. "It's taken me this long to track you down," he said. His voice was an old, familiar one, and Mohinder wished he could have lent the fellow his daughter, just to help him get in touch sooner. Through Navid's caramel-on-granite voice, Mohinder could see the green-lined campus, the blue sky, and it was like a breath of air. "To tell you the truth, son, I was always something of an aficionado of your father's research. Although he didn't have the evidence to back it up, I saw no reason why the people he spoke of in theory could not, in fact, exist. It would make me terribly sad to think of his passing without his work coming to fruition. Tell me, young one, did he ever find them?"

"Yes." _And they killed him,_ he added to himself.

"How delightful!" Mohinder could practically hear the jowls bouncing with excitement. "What a shame, though, that he was unable to return and lecture on his findings. I'm sure there would have been interest from our sister universities as well."

All of a sudden, Mohinder was a castaway who had caught sight of an approaching helicopter. "I've e-- I've been expanding b-- on his research," he blurted out, his words falling over each other in a somersaulting rush. "I've been able to do e-extensive sampling, and testing, and t-there have been a number of..."

And that's how it began. A week later, sure enough, Mohinder was alone and flying across the globe again, seeking out his corner of the sky.

_* Winds of change are set to blow and sweep this whole land through... Morning glow is long past due *_

And the reception in India had been wonderful, and Navid had taken him to a five-star restaurant the night he arrived. And colleague after colleague of his fathers had lined up to press their hands into his and congratulate him on the successful completion of his father's research.

But it was too bad that Mohinder was sane and not a crackpot. Because they obviously figured that a crackpot would pay no heed to the whispered snickers and derisive glances. Navid entreated him not to mind them. "If your evidence is sound, it will speak for itself!" he insisted. But Mohinder had always been much more aware of the politics of science than his father (and, apparently, Navid) had ever been. His first lecture on the topic was attended by barely a dozen people, and at least half of them were only there for the absurdity factor. People who could fly? People who could _explode_? Based on the audience reaction, Mohinder wasn't sure he was not on stage at a comedy club.

It was almost frightening how quickly he managed to get from the door of his hotel room to the telephone that evening. He had to hear Molly's voice, needed that sweet ray of sunshine that believed in him and trusted him and (he hoped) loved him. When she was finished and had thoroughly cheered him up she handed the phone back to Matt, who told him, "Don't worry, everything's under control." Mohinder bit back a laugh, imagining Matt's version of under control. He would have to remember to wear a clothespin on his nose when he returned home.

It wasn't until later that night that he realized he was actually homesick.

And he moved from the university in India to its sister university in Greece, where his father had taken him some summers of his boyhood, and he received a similarly lukewarm set of audiences. Greece was just as magical as he'd remembered. The ruins whispered stories that had enticed generations; the people smiled big, big grins, as though they couldn't contain their joy at being alive; the breeze coming off the Mediterranean was heady, and Mohinder considered dallying here for a while, growing fat off baklava and doing conventional research. Not ruffling any feathers. Just watching Molly grow tall and tan on the beaches, teaching her to swim between semesters of teaching basic graduate-level genetics, no mention to anyone of what she could do and what he had seen.

But there was something missing from that fantasy. It was only a few lonely nights before Mohinder had to admit to himself that the missing piece was one that pinked his laundry on a regular basis and couldn't cook.

_* but please don't get me wrong, he was the best to come along in a long, long while *_

Then Bennet contacted him halfway through the tour. "God damn it, you're a hard man to track down," he barked into the phone.

"So I've been told," said Mohinder, amused.

"I'm calling to warn you. There's someone who's watching you. An middle-aged man in glasses," he said.

"What, you mean that's not you?"

"He wants to take you back to the Company," Bennet seemed incapable of humor. "Unless you want to see Molly back in the hands of people who don't give a damn about her, you will not play his game."

Mohinder's heart was pounding again. "So what game should I play?"

"Just stay away from him. You're not equipped to handle him." That same superior, smirking tone that the professors used when they asked their polite, packaged questions of him. You obviously aren't in your right mind, Doctor, so I am going to make this simple. You obviously can't handle playing with the grown-ups.

"Try me," he spat into the phone.

The plan that Bennet eventually outlined was barely possible; it seemed more like a game of slow suicide than an operation that had any chance of succeeding. But Mohinder was sick of turning slowly on the spit of loneliness and ridicule; if he was going to continue to run from normality he was going to do it at breakneck speed, even if it meant actually breaking his neck.

In Cairo, the man with glasses took the bait, and Mohinder began to feel the giddy pull of destiny. The tinder box had been lit; now it was just time for him to jump inside.

_* Think about your life, Pippin... days are tame and nights the same.. now think about the beauty in one perfect flame! *_

Bennet was the Leading Player, pulling Mohinder's Pippin toward his inevitable conclusion. What could be more noble, more extraordinary, than sacrificing himself for the greater good? Molly was in good hands, that he knew. And Mohinder's place on this earth was not at the bedside of a child. Just as it was not taking out the garbage, just as it was not cooking meals or giving lectures on how to do laundry. He was meant for something greater than that.

And when Mohinder returned to that New York apartment, that night, he was sure it was more or less to say goodbye. As he turned the key in the lock, he was sure he could hear the chorus in that final number, singing his own theme song back to him--

"Rivers belong where they can ramble... eagles belong where they can fly..."

And then his eyes fell on Matt, sleeping in the chair beside Molly's bed. And the chorus faded into nothing, and Mohinder felt tears prickle in his eyes.

_* I'm not a river or a giant bird that soars to the sea... and if I'm never tied to anything, I'll never be free * _

He went to the kitchen to sort himself out, and that's when Matt found him, thought he was an intruder, nearly scared him to death. And when they talked, Mohinder heard himself say, "I'll be around to help with Molly." And then she was there, and hugging him, and he was promising her he'd never leave again, and Matt was staring at them both, quiet expectation in his eyes.

And when she'd gone back to bed, secure and happy and safe, Mohinder found the wherewithal, finally, to crumple into tears on the bathroom floor. Those chains weren't holding him down, after all... they were holding him _together._

_ * Imagine my surprise when I raised my eyes and there he was * _

Matt was awake. Matt was knocking on the door. Wanted to know if he was OK. And Mohinder looked around and realized that the bathroom had been cleaned, and the garbage had been taken out, and a new tube of toothpaste had been bought. And somehow all this made him happier than a million successful lectures ever could.

"You took care of everything," he said through the doorway.

"Of course," Matt answered. "What did you think I was going to do?"

"It wasn't you." Mohinder smiled through his tears. "It was the cockroaches. I was sure they were going to eat you both while I was gone."

"That's disgusting." Mohinder felt a pressure against the door, the sliding down of Matt's back as he sat heavily on the floor. Mohinder's back would have been pressed against his if there hadn't been the three inches of wood between them.

"We missed you," Matt said gruffly.

"I missed her too."

"I didn't say she," Matt corrected him. "I said we."

Mohinder paused. "I know you did," he said. "I'm sorry."

"It's OK." Matt's voice was quiet, casual. "Look, what I said earlier, about you being an amateur? I'm sorry. I'm sure you can hack it. You're a brilliant guy, after all. It's just that we worry. _I_ worry. You and Molly are kinda my family, you know? So I just... don't want to lose you."

The words were too sincere, too open and caring. Mohinder lost himself, sobbing for a long minute. Matt was quiet, just listening behind the door. "I... I'm sorry," he gulped. "It's very hard on me..."

"I know, I know," Matt said soothingly. "But you don't have to face this alone. Look, the sun's almost up. Why don't you get some rest. You must be jet-lagged as hell."

Mohinder's breath caught in his throat. Another song was threading through his mind. One that began with a lyric about sitting on the floor and talking till dawn. The name of that piece was "Love Song."

He opened the door, his face still tear-streaked. He couldn't meet Matt's eyes.

He didn't have to. Strong arms came around him and held him tight. "I'm here," Matt said into his shoulder. "I'm here. I've always been here."

Mohinder clung to him. He was large and strong and full of everything he needed, all the normality he'd run from all his life. His tears stained Matt's cheek, his chin, the cotton of his shirt. "Thank you," he whispered. "It's good to be home."

Matt lifted his hands to wipe the tears from his cheeks. It was then that the wet eyes met his and knocked the breath right out of him. And Mohinder was the one who tugged at him then, bringing Matt's face toward his. Their eyes slitted closed in unison.

_ * And time weaves ribbons of memory to sweeten life when youth is through_  
_But I would need no memories there if I could share my life with you *_  
:end:


	14. radio-cassette player/rajikase

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Set after 2x09; for the purposes of this story we will assume that what we see in the preview for 2x10 does not happen immediately but rather on some subsequent day...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Set after 2x09

"Molly." Matt rapped on the door.

"I'm not speaking to you!" Shouted from the other side. She'd locked herself in.

Matt sighed. "Come on, Molly, open the door!"

Her voice was tinged with sadness. "Why don't you make me? You can do that now!"

So he did. **_Open the door._**

The handle turned and her tear-streaked face appeared, glowering at him. "There. You made me do it. Does that make you feel good? That you can control me like he did?"

"What do you mean? Who?"

"You _know_ who."

The words were enough. Matt stepped back, aghast.

"I don't trust you anymore," Molly said quietly, her voice shaking. "I thought I could trust you, and you did this--"

"Did my father make you do something?"

This was the wrong thing to say, apparently. She bristled like an angry cat and screamed "You don't get it!", running back into her room and slamming the door.

Matt sighed again, leaned against the door. "I'm just trying to help you."

"Then leave me alone!" The scream was hysterical, both angry and frightened. A moment later he could hear the screeches of her desk's legs as she pulled it in front of the door to block it.

He'd thought she was mad about something minor. One of those things only kids understand and then promptly forget about. So when she wouldn't come out of her room for dinner, he thought he'd exercise a little parental authority. How shortsighted he'd been. She had every right to be mad.

She'd been here before. She probably well knew the warps and tugs of a mind that was being manipulated. After all, Angela Petrelli had also been able to recognize-- and resist, to some extent-- his suggestions. Molly was probably no less familiar with the signs. Children are surprisingly good at picking up on things. He'd learned this in the scant few months he'd been an accidental father.

It was the fear in her voice that got to him. He'd heard that fear before, in too many situations. But it'd never been fear _of him._ How could he protect her from the monsters if he was one himself?

* * *

Near midnight, the latch on the front door clicked, and Matt, who was nursing a coffee and a headache, sprang up to help Mohinder with his luggage. He opened the door and scooped the suitcases off the ground, glad to be doing something that didn't involve feeling sorry for himself. Then he straightened up and saw that Mohinder's head was bowed low, his shoulders full of tension. Matt dropped the cases.

The thud of them hitting the floor propelled Mohinder into motion. He surged forward into Matt's arms, head against his shoulder, sobbing uncontrollably. Matt stared for a moment at the unexpected contact, then did what anyone would do-- he put his arms around him and held tight. Mohinder's weight was warm against him, his face hot with tears and frustration. Matt touched the black curls that were vibrating with the force of the tears. He wasn't sure of a whole lot, but he knew Mohinder needed him. And he had no choice but to be there.

* * *

It took the better part of an hour to coax the story out, but once Mohinder got talking, he didn't seem to want to stop. He was the same as most rookies who'd had their first experience with shooting a perp; it was a matter of getting all of their thought process out into the open and seeing if it stood under the light or went scurrying into the darkness. Every time, they were so afraid of seeming like a cold-blooded killer, and every time, their brothers in blue banded around them. The funny thing was, it was never the ones who agonized about it that you had to worry about. The guys who exulted in their first kill, they were the ones to watch out for.

"I suppose I'm fortunate that it's the Company I'm dealing with, after all," said Mohinder, much calmer, after a cup and a half of tea and a lot of tissues. "At least I'm assured that there will be no legal ramifications. Unless, of course, I'm confessing this to just the wrong person." He looked nervously up at Matt.

"Nah," Matt said, his voice gravelly. "I wouldn't."

Relief flushed through the delicate features. "I'm glad to hear you say that. Now I just have to learn to live with myself."

"You will," Matt said, patting his hand comfortingly across the table. "We all do, eventually." He tried to avoid wishing someone would say the same to him.

"God, I hope you're right," Mohinder sighed, getting up to refill his cup. "I have the feeling I won't be sleeping much tonight."

"No," Matt said, "me neither."

Mohinder turned around. Matt's head was in his hands. If he stared any harder at his empty teacup he would burn a hole in it.

"I'm sorry, Matt," he said, taking the cup from beneath those intense eyes and filling it with steaming water. "I've been so focused on myself..."

"No, that's fine," Matt said, giving a smile that was at least half sincere. "You had a tough time."

"It looks like you did, too." Mohinder sat down across from him again and drew the teabag in small circles along the bottom of the cup. "Did you want to share?"

Matt shook his head weakly. "Nah. No, it's all good." He stared at his tea emptily, wishing he could just curl up inside that cup and drown. "There is a favor you could do for me, though."

"Oh?"

"Yeah." He got up, his frame feeling far too heavy and bulky to drag around, and labored his way over to the counter. "I take it you'll wake Molly up in the morning? Give her a surprise?"

Mohinder grinned despite his troubles. "That was more or less my plan."

"Good," Matt said. "Would you give her this?"

He turned around and handed a heavy black object to Mohinder. It was an old-school radio/cassette player, the kind with the carrying handle and the tiny silver microphone built into the top. The antenna was broken off and the battery pack was missing its cover - the batteries were taped in with clear packing tape. There was a tape, rewound, inside the machine, with the scrawled words "4 MOLLY" on the label.

"What's this?"

Matt waved his hand dismissively as he started down the hall. "You'll see in the morning," he said. "I'll be in my room." Mohinder stared after him, then down at the tape recorder. He definitely would not be sleeping tonight.

* * *

"Wake up, sweetheart."

"Nnh... but 's Saturday..."

"Even so. I've waited all night to see you."

"What's...." And just like that, she sprang up and into his arms. "Mohinder!"

"Hi, princess. I'm home." There was no more beautiful morning than this, Mohinder thought as he stroked her long hair. There was no redemption he needed other than this, a morning, skinny arms tight around him, the trust and love of a child. It would all be all right. It had to be. He wouldn't subject Molly to anything less.

"I missed you," she whispered through an uncontrollable grin. "I missed you a lot."

"I missed you too, darling," he said, and squeezed her until she squeaked. She giggled and batted her hands at him playfully. "Have you been sleeping all right?"

"Perfect!" she enthused, rounding her thumb and forefinger into the OK sign. "Hey, what's that?"

Mohinder had put the tape recorder at the foot of her bed and forgotten about it in the joy of seeing her, but Molly had the curiosity of a cat and the eyes of one, too, and, catlike, she leapt through Mohinder's arms and over to the strange object. It occurred to Mohinder that she might be too young to have ever _seen_ a tape player.

"Oh, sweetie, don't worry about that," he said, all at once nervous as to what was on it himself. He'd finally found some sanity and light after all the confusion; he didn't want it to slip away again.

But he wasn't quick enough; whether she was too young for tapes or not, she did know the shape of the "play" button, and all of a sudden white noise filled the room. Mohinder moved quickly to slide the volume button down slightly so their ears wouldn't be blown away.

"Um, hi."

Matt's voice. Sort of rumbly and a little too close to the microphone.

"Hi, Molly. I'm sorry about this, but I wanted to talk to you and I knew you were still mad at me."

Mohinder glanced at Molly. Her big eyes were shimmering; she was listening quietly, her lips turned down into a frown of concentration. He decided not to ask yet.

"Um, I don't really know how to say this. You're right, I didn't get it. I didn't realize it, but I really used you. I was kind of... excited, I guess... to think about what I might be able to do, and I sort of tested it on you before I knew it. I thought maybe I was just talking into your mind at first. I didn't realize I... but I should have. And now I'm making excuses."

There was a small, choked sound, as though Matt had bitten back tears as he was recording.

"Anyway, this is the only way I could think to, without you being worried I was getting in your head again, to say I'm sorry." His voice broke. He _had_ been crying. And the tears were unrestrained now. "I'm really sorry. I would never hurt you, not on purpose. I'm sorry that sometimes I do without meaning it. I promise that I will never do that again, no matter how mad I get, no matter what kind of fight we have, if you can just forgive me. I hope you can."

And, with heartbreaking sadness: "You're my little girl, Molly. You're my _daughter._ I love you."

The tape clicked into nothing.

Mohinder was at once sure he knew what had happened and sure there was more to it than that. Someday he'd get the whole story. But right now he had to put his arms around a girl who was sobbing in relief and love and sadness, and tell her everything was all right.

* * *

Matt was fairly sure, at this point, that there were precisely 249 cracks in the ceiling. He'd counted them at least twice. And he'd just gotten around to naming them when there was suddenly another crack.

A crack of light. Coming through his bedroom door.

He sat up, the previous night's sleeplessness lost. There was a tentative hazel eye peeking through that crack.

His hair was a mess, and he needed to shave, and he couldn't speak. Matt looked an absolute sight. But his face as Molly pushed through the door, so full of love and pleading and fear to even hope, struck Mohinder as something lovely beyond words. He stayed outside the door and watched.

She stood just inside the room, fumbling with her hair, looking at her feet. Her jaw was trembling.

Matt got up, kneeled down so he could look her in the eye, but didn't approach her. Just gazed at her, waited for her eyes to meet his. Her chin was slow in turning up. Slow in reaching that moment of contact.

There was an instant where she read everything that was in those dark, sleepiness-blurred eyes.

And then she was in his arms, and he was on his feet, cradling her, crying and laughing and dancing with her, and Mohinder could believe in redemption, because Molly _was_ redemption. They would be OK, both of them, with all their mistakes and all their flaws and all their bad choices, because she believed in them and she loved them. He'd thought that, over the past few days, he'd run out of tears. He was wrong.

Then Molly leaned back in Matt's arms and reached out a hand to him. An invitation like that was one Mohinder couldn't refuse. He came into the room, into the circle of the embrace, one arm on her back, another along Matt's shoulders, feeling the completeness and the hope that was family. Matt couldn't spare a hand, so he simply leaned his head in toward Mohinder's.

And then, still giddy with the happiness and the comfort, as though it were the most natural thing in the world, Mohinder brushed his lips against his.

Matt's eyes flew wide open. The two stared at each other for a long moment above their daughter's head. Mohinder averted his eyes, kissing the crown of those strawberry-blonde locks instead, too invested in this moment to ruin it because of just one impulsive kiss.

Finally, Molly straightened up in Matt's arms and smiled broadly at the both of them. "I'm sorry I was scared," she said earnestly to Matt, ruffling his hair further.

"I'm sorry I scared you," he answered.

"So we're going to do something fun today, right?" she grinned. "Now that Mohinder's home."

Mohinder and Matt looked at each other, the same expression on both their faces: _When did this get decided?_

Might as well go with it. "Sure, darling, what do you want to do?" Mohinder asked.

"Mmmm, dunno!" With a mighty push she leapt from Matt's grip, causing him to gasp in momentary panic that he had somehow dropped her. Mohinder knew the feeling well. "But I am hungry. Can I have the sugar Os this time?" She didn't wait for an answer; the cage door was open and that little bird had flown the coop.

"Don't make yourself sick!" Matt shouted after her.

Mohinder slumped backward against the door, shutting it behind him. "I think I know what happened," he said, looking down.

"Yeah. I'm sorry I didn't tell you," Matt said. "Look, I owe you an explanation. I'm not sure how it happened, but it did, and I didn't mean to do it to Molly, but I did... that sounds pathetic, I know. To tell you the truth, I did something I'm not so proud of the other day... I think I made the right decision, but it doesn't make it any easier. I guess we're in the same boat."

"Exactly," said Mohinder. "I think that's why."

"What?"

"Just now. I think that's why I did that. Because we're both facing the same demons."

"Mohinder, what the hell are you talking about?" Matt's emotions were so keyed up that ecstatic happiness flew right into confused anger without so much as a change in gears. "When you say you know what happened..."

"I don't want you to worry about it," Mohinder said. "We both have enough on our minds. Much more important things."

Matt stared at him, and a question mark rose up through his throat and then died again. "Oh."

Mohinder looked up at him, cheeks flaming red.

Matt shrugged. "To tell you the truth, Mohinder? You're right. We've got enough to worry about right now."

"Exactly," Mohinder said, trying to beat back a sudden, unpleasant wave of feeling. Was he actually _disappointed_ that Matt was agreeing with him? But he'd meant it; this wasn't the time for such things.

"I mean, why should I worry about something that made me happy, for God's sake?"

This made Mohinder's head snap up.

Matt was smiling at him. Really, genuinely smiling. "You and Molly are my family," he said. "You're all I've got. I wonder all the time if this is going to be it, this is the last mistake, I'm out on my ass. But so far, despite all the stupid things I've done, you still seem OK with keeping me around. So anytime, any way you decide to tell me you're still OK with me? I'll take it."

Mohinder cupped his hands over his mouth and nose like he had a handful of days before. Now, like then, he was seriously fearing for his life. But this time, it was because his heart was exploding, dousing his insides in luminescent red bubbles..

"Mohinder? You OK, man?" Matt put a hand on his shoulder. "That nose bothering you?"

"Nose--" He fingered the white strip of bandage and laughed. "Oh, that. No. No. I just..." His hand slackened, found its way to the large hand on his shoulder. "Matt, OK with you? You think I'm not OK with you? I _need_ you. I wouldn't have made it through last night without you."

"Then what's the problem?"

How could he be this simpleminded? "The problem? I kissed you! Normally this would scare someone away! How can you just stand there like nothing happened?"

"I never said nothing happened," Matt said. His voice had taken on a low, guttural tone. "I said I wasn't going to worry about it."

"I don't understand."

"Let me make it simple for you, then." The voice was now husky, and oh so close. Mohinder could barely look. But it was another hug he was drawn into, nothing more seductive than that. "I'm here for you," said that whisper so close to his ear, "and nothing you could say or do is going to change that. You are my family. I can't say that enough. You're my family."

It was a long time before Mohinder could move in that embrace. When he finally circled his arms around Matt's waist, Matt sighed and smiled.

Their second kiss would come, but not today. Today was a day for family.

:end:  



	15. perfect blue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A bright, sweet, short summer romance, set in spring, to get you through the winter.

"Hey, Mohinder," Molly announced after dinner one night, "I bet your favorite color is pink."

Matt, at the sink, burst into loud laughter. Mohinder looked at Molly as though she'd just declared that Elvis was not only alive, but down at the corner store buying organic tofu. "What makes you think that?"

"Because you wear so much of it." This set Matt into a fresh round of giggles.

"Well, nice try, princess, but you're wrong." Mohinder pressed a finger to her pert little nose, and she squeaked. "I don't have a favorite color."

"That's not true. Everyone has a favorite color," Molly declared with the certainly only an eight-year-old could muster with a straight face. "Mine's green. Hey, Matt, get him to tell me what his favorite color is."

"Uh, OK," Matt said, half-turning around. "Hey, Mohinder, what color is DNA?"

Mohinder pouted. "It is a conspiracy. I can't win."

He was, of course, lying. Mohinder did have a favorite color; he just didn't know its name. It was the color of the light in Matt's eyes when he talked about a case he was working on or the latest thing he couldn't believe Molly was smart enough to say. It was the color of Mohinder's heart when he watched Matt going about his domestic duties in his usual good-hearted, slightly grumbly way. It was the color that tinted his fantasies of throwing his arms around those huge shoulders and whispering into his ear all the things he'd been feeling and hoping and dreaming about. It was a bittersweet color, something like amber, but Mohinder couldn't name it.

Molly had changed targets. "You have a favorite color, Matt, don't you?"

"Yep." Matt dried his hands on the dishtowel and turned toward her.

"Well, what is it?"

No hesitation. "Blue."

Molly was decidedly nonplussed by this answer. "Blue? That's so boring. Besides, there's a million kinds of blue. Which one?"

Mohinder had half expected Matt to say "NYPD blue," which would have been funny as hell and flown right over Molly's head. But instead, those eyes gained the light that took Mohinder's breath away. "I'll take you to see it," he said quietly.

* * *

A few weeks later the three of them were on a train bound for Maryland. It wasn't too long a trip, and it was Molly's first time on a train. She oohed and ahhed and wanted to go see the locomotive and the boxcar and the caboose, which made the both of them laugh and explain to her pouting face that these days trains really didn't have them anymore. At Baltimore they got off the train and rented a car, and an hour later they pulled up to a large, staid house surrounded by rushes and tall grass.

An elderly woman in an apron, who had about six chins, rushed out to greet them. "Matty!" she gushed. "Oh, Matty, look at you! It's been forever. You are the spitting image of your father, you know that?" He did not seem too pleased at the comparison, but he smiled and nodded appropriately. "Oh, and these are your friends? Welcome, you two! What's your name, dearie?" She bent down and produced a lollipop from a pocket of her apron, which Molly grabbed and unceremoniously popped in her mouth. The woman straightened up. "Pardon me, I'm so rude. I'm Donna, this is my husband Herb." (The man in the overalls carrying their luggage inside stopped to wave one suitcase-laden arm.) "Welcome to our little place. Matty and his dad used to come up here in the summer and catch us all crabs for supper. How is your father, by the way?"

Matt looked decidedly uncomfortable. "He's... doing all right," he said noncommittally.

Donna didn't seem the slightest bit suspicious. "Well, we saved the balcony room for you, Matty, oh, don't worry, the balcony is for everyone, it's just he likes to be close to it, he was always out there on evenings..." She went on in that way for several more minutes, talking a blue streak to all of them by turns, until they were on the second floor of the small bed-and-breakfast. Each had a key to one of the three bedrooms, and they were standing just inside a set of sliding glass doors that opened out onto a spacious wooden balcony. Beyond the trees that lined the property, Mohinder could see the calm blue of the Chesapeake Bay stretching out into infinity. He glanced at Matt. The eyes were shining, and there was a big grin spread out across his face. Mohinder swallowed hard in a vain effort to get his heart out of his throat and back where it belonged.

* * *

A flock of seagulls squawked noisily at Molly as she went tearing down the beach, kicking up a small cloud with every pound of her feet into the soft sand. She'd wiggled out of her shoes several yards back, and Matt was carrying them loosely by his side. He was wearing flip-flops, and Mohinder was carrying his own shoes and socks after giving up when the scratchy sand had thoroughly invaded them. He hoped his bare feet weren't having too much of a corrosive effect on the environment; he was fairly sure they were a biohazard of some sort.

The water was cold and too full of seaweed for swimming, and there was a bit of a nip in the air, it being still the beginnings of spring. But that was just as well. The tourists hadn't yet come out, so the beaches and marinas were sleepy. An old man sat not too far away, fishing line in hand, but he was the only other person in sight.

"Bet he's crabbing, like we used to," Matt mused as they walked by.

"Your father took you here?" Mohinder asked.

"Before he flew the coop, yeah." Matt's face betrayed no emotion, and Mohinder wished he knew a way to borrow his ability just for an instant, just long enough to divine what he was feeling. But Matt had fallen silent and was gazing out past the bobbing white sailboats. All Mohinder wanted was to take his hand and continue to walk along the beach with him, following the small ray of sunshine who was running from the waves and squealing when the surf tickled her toes. That would be ideal.

Sometimes, when Matt wasn't around to hear, Mohinder let himself want more than just to hold his hand. Sometimes he fantasized about running his fingers along that well-worn cheek, dipping a thumb into the chapped lower lip, turning that face to his for a kiss. Sometimes he even dared fantasize beyond that.

Matt hadn't been Mohinder's "type" to start out with. He'd always enjoyed looking at the skinnier, baby-faced, lithe men who were pretty rather than built, and he'd always been drawn to personalities that were larger than life. But something about Matt's presence-- how commandingly it could fill a room in a moment of crisis, and yet how modestly it sat at the table in the morning, demanding nothing of its surroundings-- had taken him by surprise. Matt was a bundle of contradictions. He was strong yet agile, a combination Mohinder hadn't thought possible, and he had confidence with a gun yet fear of a pen. At first Mohinder had thought he was merely fascinated with the paradoxes of Matt Parkman, the man inside a child inside a man that he was. But time had tempered Mohinder's ability to lie to himself.

Take, for example, the time Matt had been coming out of the shower, and Mohinder had been captivated by the way an errant drop of water from his wet head landed on and clung to his shoulder, then streaked along the muscles of his upper arm before diving to its death from his elbow. Or the time he had been moving Molly's new chest of drawers into her room, and his T-shirt was heavy with sweat, and Mohinder had actually closed his eyes and breathed in the scent of a man working hard for his family. It was pretty clear, by the third or fourth time Mohinder caught himself thoroughly enjoying Matt in his tightest pair of jeans, that, type or no type, he was attracted to him. Hell, he flat-out wanted him.

And now Matt had run forward to catch up to Molly playing in the surf, and now he'd rolled his jeans up to his calves and had hoisted her on his shoulders. And they were braving the seaweed together, and he was lamenting the coldness of the water in a high falsetto, and she was laughing as he kicked seaweed off his foot and it flew so high it nearly landed on her. A wave broke against his knees, the spray flying upward, little prisms reflecting three, four, a thousand colors against the light. And Mohinder laughed and cheered and cried a little inside, because he knew he was in love with him.

* * *

Molly had turned in for the night after a long and rollicking dinner of crab cakes and crab jokes and crab impressions and finally Molly becoming quite crabby herself, as she was pretty exhausted and wanted to stop hanging with the grown-ups and go to her room. It was her very first time to have a hotel room all to herself, so there were no arguments when they told her to go in and get to bed. They were all very aware that she would probably not be sleeping for a good long while, but God bless this B&B for actually having parental controls on the TVs, so they could rest easy.

Afterwards, Mohinder had wandered downstairs, where Donna had told him tales of Maury and Matty Parkman and their infamous August crab-fishing expeditions, while Herb fixed him a martini in the kitchen from supermarket drink mix. Mohinder felt he understood a little bit more now how betrayed Matt had felt when his father left. He'd worshipped him. Much as Mohinder had his own father, but Mohinder had been a grown man when his father left. Matt had been but a child.

He took his half-finished drink upstairs and stepped out onto the balcony. The sky was a brilliant red, with burnt purple flecks of clouds. The sun was behind him, and the water looked like burnished copper beyond the trees. Matt was at the railing, gazing out on the water.

"She's a very nice lady," Mohinder said, striding up to stand beside him. "I suppose this place holds a lot of memories for you."

Matt nodded. "I've known her all my life. When we moved to the West Coast when I was 10, this place was one of the hardest to let go of. I wanted so badly to write them letters, but it was so hard to do. I couldn't ever make the addresses look right."

"I see." Mohinder drained his martini and set the glass down on a small wicker table. There was just the slight beginning of a breeze ruffling Matt's hair and kissing his skin. Mohinder was horribly jealous of it. He wanted to run his fingers down that neck and make him shiver, too.

"The best memory I have of this place," said Matt, a small secret smile on his face, "is from when I was eight or nine, and Dad was letting me cast the line myself for the first time. It was still early in the morning when we started, and the water had been all pink because of the sunrise. I'd kind of fallen asleep with the line in my hands. Then it started to tug, and I woke up and pulled it in and I had actually caught a crab, little old me, with my own two hands!" His face was rosy with remembered excitement. "I remember taking it out of the trap and feeling it wriggle in my hands, and being afraid it was going to pinch me. It felt all slimy, like it slept in seaweed. It probably did, actually. And I looked up, and this is the part that's my favorite."

Matt leaned forward further, and a bit of an ache crept into his voice. "I saw my dad through the crab's little spindly legs. And he was smiling so proudly. I thought he was going to fly away, he looked so proud. And then I could see the water behind him, and it had changed color, because the sun was up now." His voice dropped nearly to a whisper-- an awed, hushed tone. "The bay was this gorgeous, incredible shade of blue. Perfect blue. That blue is still my favorite color."

He looked up, a little chastened and amused at having gone on so long, but his rueful words of apology died along with his smile. Instead, his face went slack, and he stared at Mohinder. Silver tears were sliding down his dark cheeks.

"I'm in love with you," Mohinder said quietly.

Matt stared. For several minutes. Mohinder gazed back through unwavering eyes.

Matt's lips twitched and began to move several times, as though trying to find the shape of the right words to say. Every time, his jaw dropped into uselessness again. Finally, he just sighed.

"I... I thought you ought to know," Mohinder said. "No, that's a lie, I didn't. I wasn't going to tell you. But now you know."

"You're...?" Matt started to step forward. His hand extended, then fell back to his side. "But you can't be. That would mean..."

Mohinder felt bitterness rising up, regret at what he'd said, fear of Matt's response, uncertainty about the one thing in his life that, no matter what else went wrong, could always be counted on to be a sure thing, until now-- his family, his home. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said anything. I... I'll try not to... to love you as much as I do. I'll try to figure out how to stop. There must be a way. Please don't... don't... I don't even know what, just please don't do it."

The sadness was breaking him apart. He wished his frozen limbs would return to life so he could run away. And the only part of him that was still moving was on overdrive. "It wasn't intentional. It was just that I watched you with Molly all the time and how you handled her was so wonderful, and I wished I knew all the things you did about raising a child..."

"Like lullabies in foreign languages and fairy stories she had never read before in any book?" The words went unheard.

"...And then I started watching you at other times, and I was struck by your sense of justice, your absolute determination to do what was right..."

"A man selling his own soul to help a sick woman and prevent a deadly disease from spreading...?" Still, the words flew into empty air.

"...And I really did try to fight it, even though I knew I had never met a man like you before and probably never would again..."

"...who took in not only a little girl with nowhere to go but a man at the end of his rope and made them both his family?"

And Mohinder's words disappeared as the last of his functions froze up because now he heard what Matt had been saying all this time, and because Matt had moved forward and taken his hands and then put an arm around his waist, and because Matt was gazing into his eyes, and because Matt was _smiling._

"Why would a guy who was all of that want with a dumbass, divorced, closeted cop? So I didn't tell you how I felt." His eyes were sparkling with Mohinder's favorite color.

"Matt, please," Mohinder begged breathlessly, "go back and start from the beginning, I wasn't listening."

"Sorry, too late," breathed Matt as he kissed him.

Softness and sweetness blossomed inside Mohinder like a carpet of roses. His arms wound around his neck, Matt's hands on his waist tightening, and he melted backward into those strong hands until he was clinging to him just for balance. Matt's kiss was as glorious as the rest of him. Mohinder's eyes slitted open briefly. The last of the sunlight had disappeared, and the canopy of sky, dotted with pale stars, was perfect blue.

They remained on the balcony for a long time that night, talking, sharing, kissing, smiling, amazed at how they'd finally come together. From her bedroom window, Molly watched them for a time, then smiled and turned out the light.

And the next summer, Molly and Mohinder both learned how to fish for crabs.

:end:  



	16. invincible/muteki

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Have you ever had your day ruined, Mohinder? Say, someone gives you a phone call and it just all goes to hell from there?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SPOILERS up to 2x10. This fic is muuuuch less romantic than the rest. It's also my first crack at writing Sylar, so EEP dun kill me.

The bastard is waiting for him when he gets there. Sitting at his desk. Reading his old newspapers. Even wearing his spare pair of glasses. "Welcome home, Dr. Suresh," he says, spinning around in his chair to smile genially.

"Where is Molly?" Three words. Because two aren't enough to make the point and four are too many. He is not interested in engaging this man in conversation.

Sylar hooks a thumb over his shoulder, points toward the bedroom. "She wasn't so happy to see me, so I gave her a little something to help her sleep. An over-the-counter, nothing fatal. It didn't even say 'keep out of reach of children.' See? I'm a good stepfather."

Mohinder does not like the connotations of that last word. "What do you want?"

He gets up, walks over, puts a hand on Mohinder's shoulder, looks plaintively into his eyes. "Honestly, Doctor? I want myself back. I want to be able to do the things I used to do."

"Like kill people and take their abilities?"

"Among other things." He shrugs as though it's just one in a long list, starts to pace around the room like he still lives here. His familiarity in the surroundings makes Mohinder very uneasy. "Do you have any idea just how _frustrating_ it is to wake up and not be able to do anything you used to do? And just for laughs, you kill a woman and realize you can't take her power? Oh, it just _ruined_ my day. Have you ever had your day ruined, Mohinder? Say, someone gives you a phone call and it just all goes to hell from there?"

His smile was infuriating. "And why would I want to help you?"

"Besides the fact that your little munchkin is probably dreaming about her boogeyman right now? I'm sure she'd be calling out to you if it weren't for that little duct-tape-on-the-mouth problem. Don't worry, she can breathe," he adds at Mohinder's sudden exclamation. "For now, at least. I'm still torn between letting you watch me kill her and killing you both at the same time. Decisions, decisions... Oh, but wait, Mohinder, I'd meant to ask. Who's been staying in my old room?"

Matt.

His last chance. His only hope.

_Matt!_ Mohinder thinks as loud and as hard as he can.

"Well, I suppose it doesn't really matter," Sylar says, and then the worst thing happens, Sylar has put his arms around him and is whispering in his ear. "I know nobody will ever replace me." Mohinder wants to push him back and shout at him that he was never welcome in his life to begin with, that he was an unwanted interloper, and that anything that might have happened between them was annulled the minute he realized he wasn't Zane Taylor after all. Even before he realized he was a psychopathic mass murderer who was responsible for the death of his father and so many others. The first lie was enough. The rest were just details.

But Mohinder stays stock still because now he knows who this man is, and he's dangerous, too dangerous to try to surprise. He just keeps yelling inside his head. _MATT! Are you anywhere near? We need you. Molly needs you! Sylar is here..._

Murderer fingers on his cheek. "Mohinder, you look so serious. What are you thinking about? Don't tell me..."

What if Matt was already dead and Sylar had learned to read minds? But no, Sylar doesn't have his power... he'd just said so.

Sylar has drawn back and is staring at him critically. "Why, Mohinder! You can help me, can't you? I can see it in your face. You know how I can get my power back." He sits back down on the desk chair, rocking back and forth like a child who's had too much sugar. "I knew you would! Oh, tell me everything."

_Matt Parkman, you have got to be on your way home by now, where are you?_ Mohinder can only think of one thing, and that's to stall until the man with the gun gets here. "I have a serum. It's an infusion of my blood with the blood of a girl named Claire Bennet."

"The invincible cheerleader?" Sylar leans forward. "I remember her. How is she doing, I wonder? Good to know she's still not dead. I'll have to look her up."

Mohinder is suddenly struck by the idea of an invincible Sylar. Not that anyone has managed to kill him so far, but the idea that he would be unkillable is frightening beyond belief. He regrets mentioning Claire.

"I believe she is on the run," Mohinder declares, still shouting in his mind. "There were some happenings and she lost her father, and..."

"You're stalling!" intones Sylar, grinning, almost leering up at him. "Yes, yes, I get it. So where is this serum of yours? It's not in that briefcase, is it?"

"N-no," Mohinder says, although his hand clenches around the case at his side.

"Oh, come on, Mohinder. Give it-- **here!**" With the last word, Sylar lunges for the case, and he's pushed Mohinder to the floor and they are grappling. Sylar is strong, the sort of strength that comes with being too insane to know you're weak. The floorboards are creaking underneath them, but Mohinder will not let go of the case.

_Matt, get in here, shoot me if you must but shoot him..._

His thoughts are interrupted by the sudden appearance behind Sylar's shoulders of a young woman with skin tinted bronze and a horrified look in her eyes. "Gabriel, what are you doing?" Her voice is bell-like and heavily accented, and she pronounces Sylar's birth name with an accent on the last syllable. She reaches forward to pull him off Mohinder. "'Who is this man? Is he an..." She struggles for the English word. "Intruder?"

"This is my apartment!" Mohinder barks, pushing with all his might, and between his push and her pull Sylar comes off him and goes toppling backward. Mohinder scrambles to his feet.

"But you are not Doctor Suresh! The man in the book is..."

"My father." Mohinder has finished that sentence so many times in the past several months, he's beginning to think nobody knows him for _him_ anymore. Not that it terribly much matters during a situation like this. He straightens up and kicks Sylar in the jaw, making him curse and roll over. "You'd better get out of here. This man is dangerous."

"I am not leaving," she says. "I need to find this Dr. Suresh. Where is he?"

"Mohinder, meet Maya," says Sylar on the floor with his hand to his jaw. "You two can talk for a minute. I'll just be over here." He still thinks he's a comedian, Mohinder notes with disgust.

"My father is dead," Mohinder says darkly. His eyes dart toward Molly's bedroom. If he can only get her out of here!

"Dead? No..." Her eyes go hollow and blank. "Then there is no hope..."

Her expression tugs at Mohinder's heartstrings. "Hope for what? Why were you looking for my father?"

"I needed him to help me..." She is beginning to cry now, huge translucent tears that splash to the ground. Her mouth is turned down into the look of a grotesque gargoyle. "I need him to make me normal again."

He shouldn't be feeling it, not now, but that quickening of the pulse begins in Mohinder. "You have an ability, then?" She nods. But as her chin dips down her eyes widen slightly, and Mohinder follows them down. Sylar's hand is outstretched, grabbing at his leg. Mohinder raises his foot and brings it down on his wrist, making him scream.

"What are you doing?" Now it's Maya who lunges at him, and Mohinder is fighting off her hands. "He just wanted to see your father, just like me!"

"He **killed** my father!" thunders Mohinder, and she jumps back, horrified.

She shakes her head. "No es posible... why... why? First Alejandro, and then you... why does nobody understand?"

She begins to hyperventilate and all of a sudden there is a look of panic on Sylar's face. "Maya, calm down," he shouts. "Control it. I know you can." Mohinder stares down at him in disbelief. Panic? Fear? He didn't know Sylar could feel those things. But then he's panicking himself, because it's suddenly hard to breathe, and he feels as though his eyes are bleeding, and it's all he can do to keep his heel on Sylar's wrist.

But Maya coughs, wheezes, and falls still. The air becomes breathable again, and Mohinder thinks he must have imagined the whole thing, because Sylar is grinning and doesn't look the slightest bit panicked. "Good girl. I knew you could," he says, and turns to Mohinder. "Isn't she darling?" he croons. "All that power and she is still such an idealist. It's hard to imagine what someone else would do if, every time they got a little upset, they killed everyone in the room. So I wouldn't go on about me killing your father, because she's very, very fragile right now."

Mohinder stares at him. "Killed people... you mean she...?"

"Please," Maya begs. The tone that he'd thought was like a bell has slowed down and she sounds like a tape running a third too slow. "I don't mean to."

He has to calm her. "I'm sure you don't," he assures her, mind racing. If she kills when she's upset, how can he persuade her to do anything? "Just let me take Molly somewhere else," he begs. "Then I'll do whatever you want." He looks down at Sylar, but he's lunged forward with his other hand and there is a lot of pain and a sick thud and Mohinder realizes he is on the floor and his leg is bent in a direction it's not supposed to bend. And Sylar has the case with the serum in it and is opening it. _No,_ thinks Mohinder desperately. _No._

He's scrambling to drain the serum into the syringe and Mohinder can hear a million years of Sylar's laugh in his head, Sylar becoming immortal, invincible. "Wait," he cries desperately, "there's a virus, it will kill everyone, it will kill you too, if I can't work on the vaccine, I need it..."

Sylar is spurting the excess air out of the syringe with a bright spray of red liquid; when did he become an expert on needles? "This is how much I care," he grins, pressing the needle to his arm.

But then Mohinder's ears are blown into deafness by gunshots and there is a scream, and Sylar is on the floor with blood leaking from his shoulder and he's clutching his arm, the syringe on the floor unused next to him, and Mohinder looks up and promptly for half a second believes in God again. Because Matt's in the doorway, his gun trained on Sylar, a look of absolute rage on his face. "Give me one reason I shouldn't blow you away," he growls.

"Gabriel, no!" Maya flings herself between Matt's gun and Sylar. Mohinder tries to get up, despite the sick feeling in his leg. He has got to get to Molly. It doesn't work. He falls back to the ground, propping himself up with his hands.

"I won't let you hurt him." The girl is like a feral animal now somehow; she's moaning and crying and roaring all at once.

"Look," Matt says, in full cop mode. "I don't know who you are or why you're here, but that man is not what you think. Just walk out of here, right now, or I can't promise you won't get hurt."

"I am not leaving him. Gabriel!" Sylar is acting as though he has been mortally wounded. He's shuddering and convulsing, a thousand melodramatic expressions of pain and regret crossing his snakelike face.

"He's... right, you know," he gasps to her. "I did... kill his father."

"Gabriel, what are you saying, don't talk, stay still." Her words are tumbling out.

"He had... something I wanted. I killed him to get it."

"You have a lot of death to answer for," Matt says. "The parents of that little girl, for one."

This hits Maya between the eyes. "No!"

Matt's advancing on him, the gun shaking in his hands. "Isaac Mendez..." His eyes go a little red. "Ted--"

"Stop! It's not true!" Maya screams, covering her ears.

"It's all true." Sylar's fingers closing around the syringe as he speaks. "And one more you don't know about, Maya."

"Don't let him." Pain is turning Mohinder green. He's still struggling to get up. "He'll get all his power back--"

"Do you... remember... our first kiss?" Mohinder is glad Matt doesn't seem to hear him gasp. But Sylar is talking to Maya. "It was... so special... first time I've ever had a woman kiss me... over her brother's corpse...."

Maya becomes very still.

"Sorry, Mohinder," Sylar is saying. "Maybe I should have told you I'd met someone else."

Matt turns. "Mohinder--?"

"Looks like you've moved on, too--"

Then Sylar is in pain and the world is spinning for Matt and Mohinder too because Maya is breathing heavily, wheezing, crying hysterical dark tears. Her eyes have become almost reptilian, and their eyes are burning too, spitting, bleeding. Mohinder can only think, _This is it, we're going to die, we've upset her and now she'll kill us all. Just please let her kill us all. As long as that madman dies and our little girl is safe--_

He looks up at Matt and sees the black tears on his face, sees his hand clutching his chest. "I'm sorry," he whispers, "I never got to tell you how I..."

And just before he blacks out completely, he sees Matt steel himself and lean forward--

And then, just like that, it's all gone, the pain and the stinging and the bleeding. It's gone, and the tears on their faces are the color of tears again. Mohinder tries to rise to his feet, feels his leg give, leans on a chair instead. Maya is sitting on the floor with a small, absent smile on her face, her eyes unfocused, humming to herself. Matt is looking at her with pity. "I'm sorry," he says, wiping his red eyes, and looks down at Mohinder. "Where's Molly?"

"He said she was in her room... He drugged her. What did you do?"

Matt sighs heavily. "What I swore up and down I wouldn't do. I sent her to a place where she'll be calm. I think I can still go in and get her out, but... I still wish..." His reverie ends there. "And he's next."

Mohinder stares at Matt. There is pain in that face, yes, but also power. As Matt leans in toward Sylar, Mohinder gets a unique thrill. He's never considered Matt's ability to be one of the most powerful or useful he's come across, but in this moment, he thinks Matt might very well be invincible.

"You broke my new toy!"

Sylar is on his feet and rushing toward Matt, and Mohinder sees with horror that there is a needle jammed into his arm and that the shoulder wound is healing at a remarkable rate. And now there's ice freezing and flame burning Sylar's palm by turns. Matt gives Sylar the purposeful stare he gave Maya, but Sylar only blanks for a moment. "Your Jedi mind tricks don't work on me!" he giggles gleefully. And Matt howls in pain as blood begins to drip from his forehead.

And then bang! bang! bang!

Mohinder somehow has the Company gun in his hands and has fired into Sylar's skull. The first one missed, he blocked the second, but the third is in the middle of his forehead, and Sylar falls backward a dead man.

"And I swore I wouldn't do that again..." The words barely touch air before Mohinder crumples.

Matt runs to him, holds him. Mohinder howls, a desperate cry of exhaustion and relief and sorrow. Matt squeezes his trembling shoulders tight.

"Molly--" Mohinder says breathily. Matt nods and kisses him on the forehead like he used to when Molly had a bad night. It's an expression of trust, an _I will be right back and you're not alone_ kiss.

He goes to the hallway and returns shortly. "She's fine. He had taped her mouth. I took it off. Looked into her mind, but there's nothing. He must have drugged her pretty heavily."

"He's had the serum too recently," Mohinder gasps. "Might regenerate, even from that..."

Matt nods again, grabs his cuffs from around his belt, and shackles the dead man. It won't stop him, but it will slow him down, Mohinder knows as he watches Matt work. How can he be so economical and efficient about all this? He feels like Lois Lane watching Superman. What an odd situation. Superman, a corpse, and a happily humming girl in her own private wonderland.

Matt kneels next to her next. "Don't," says Mohinder. "I'm not sure she won't kill us all when she comes out of it."

"What should we do, then?" Matt asks.

"I'll call the Company." Mohinder fumbles for his cell phone. "They'll have facilities equipped for holding them both." He begins to dial a number. His fingers are shaking from the pain and the trauma.

"Mohinder," Matt says suddenly, "when Sylar said he'd met someone else..."

Ah, here he is now, petty, everyday, weird, fixating Matt. Better late than never. Mohinder flips the phone shut with a loud snap. "I didn't know who he was. It's ancient history. I'm calling now." He opens the phone and begins to dial again.

"When he said you'd moved on, too..."

Snap. "There are two killers in our apartment and I'd like them to not be there. Do you mind, or are you too jealous?" Hopefully that will keep him occupied. The phone opens again. Beep, beep, beep...

"Yeah, I am!" He sounds petulant.

This time there's a moment before the snap. Mohinder scowls at him purposefully. "Well, don't be, because I've been in love with you ever since the first time I met you, but I need to go to the emergency room because I think my leg is broken and our daughter has been drugged, so please allow me to make this phone call!"

Matt puts his hands up innocently and backs away. But he grins a little despite himself, and when Mohinder says "I understand" and snaps the phone shut a final time, he sprints back across the room and wraps his arms around Mohinder's shoulders and kisses him fiercely.

"Do you have any idea how long I've been trying to get you to say that out loud?" he growls.

"Shut up and get Molly," Mohinder mutters, but he's flushed. "Bob told us to go ahead to the hospital, that it is best if we aren't here when they come to clean up."

Matt nods and goes into the hallway, and it suddenly hits Mohinder just how much he has survived. He's still here after nearly being at the epicenter of a nuclear explosion. He's still here after crossing the country with a murderer who could slice him open with his mind. He's still here after infiltrating a company with a specialty in biological warfare. And he's actually better off than he was before. He's gained a daughter. A family. The love of a good man.

Mohinder looks down at himself. His hands are shaking. His nose is still bruised. His leg is broken. But he thinks, all the same, he might be invincible.

:end:  



	17. KHz (kilohertz)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mohinder's thoughts are a little too complicated for Matt's simple mind.

Mohinder was not fond of Cheerios. But it was all Matt ever brought home when he did the shopping. So it was breakfast time for the adults, because Molly was watching Saturday morning cartoons and had helped herself to breakfast earlier in the morning, when they were still sleeping. They'd only lived together three months, but she had already pretty much dictated the morning routine for all three of them.

Along with the Cheerios, Matt had bought a little radio. Yet another surprising fact about Molly's hero: he listened to classical music. He didn't know much about it, couldn't tell the romantics from the baroques, but he needed it, he said. It helped his brain make sense of things.

Unfortunately, there would be no classical music today. He was turning the knob, but all that was coming forth from the thing was static. "Damn it!" he said, a fist on the counter. "Every radio I ever buy goes on the fritz. It's _meshugah._"

That's when a singular idea occurred to Mohinder. "Maybe it's feedback," he said, closing his mouth around another repugnant spoonful of Cheerios.

"Huh?" Matt looked at him with his signature _Can you speak in English before 10 A.M. on a Saturday please?_ squint.

"Maybe that's why you read minds," Mohinder said, downing another gulp of tea. "Maybe you _are_ a radio. Maybe you have a sensitivity to low-frequency waves."

"I thought you were a geneticist, not a cable guy," Matt muttered. The toast popped and he pulled the slices out and onto a plate, wincing at the heat and blowing on his fingers.

Mohinder raised his spoon as though it were a teacher's pointer. "You have to have a very broad knowledge base to go into a science still as close to its infancy as genetics is. You never know just what might end up relevant."

Matt slid into his seat with a grin. "You ass, you're just bragging."

"No, actually, it's an interesting idea. What if the human mind were able to process all the electromagnetic waves it encountered every day? It would be like radio inside one's mind all the time, on every channel."

"Sounds about right." Matt chomped on his toast and took a huge swig of coffee.

"We know, as well..." The cereal got in the way, and Mohinder had to pause to swallow. "Ahem. We know that the increased prevalence of electromagnetic waves, from cell phones, wireless Internet, satellite television, et cetera, has had an effect on human brains. There's evidence, for example, of an increased incidence of brain cancer."

"That's depressing." Matt's look led Mohinder to think he'd finally realized just how bad black coffee tasted.

"A lot of things are, when you look at them closely."

"Good point."

"But what I'm saying is, perhaps you have developed some ability to process low-frequency electromagnetic waves."

Matt tried to look up at his own forehead for a moment, or so it looked to Mohinder, who stifled a laugh at the absurd expression. "But I don't get everything. I have to concentrate. In the beginning it was different, but now I can pretty much control who I read and who I don't."

"You've learned to tune the radio."

"That's another thing." Matt jabbed a half-piece of toast in Mohinder's direction. "I don't get radio stations or anything. I've even tried," he added sheepishly. "I get thoughts, and that's it."

"They're probably out of your range." Mohinder had an answer for everything, Matt noted to himself with a grimace. "They're in the kilohertz and megahertz range, whereas brain waves are only a few hertz."

Matt shrugged. "Except for you. You think in kilohertz for sure."

"I told you not to read my mind," Mohinder frowned.

"I don't, but it's obvious you think a thousand times faster than everyone around you. Besides, why would I read your mind? I've tried before, and it mega-hurts."

Mohinder stopped in the middle of a breath, pointed his spoon at Matt, opened his mouth, and then just shook his head. "That was terrible," he groaned.

"Could be worse. It could killer-hurts."

Mohinder adjusted his stance in his chair, leaned forward, frowned. "Perhaps you should consider genetic therapy so you don't pass on that particular strain of so-called humor to your offspring?"

This was the wrong thing to say. The ink on the divorce agreement was barely dry. "Not likely now, is it," Matt muttered.

"I'm sorry. But don't say that. You'll find someone."

"I know." The mood in the sunny kitchen was dark all of a sudden. "But even so. With all of this... I mean, what if I pass on the mind-reading thing? I'm not sure I want..." He made a visible attempt to brighten. "Besides. I've got Molly. She's as much my kid as anyone at this point."

"Well, you'd be a huge asset to the gay community," Mohinder cracked. "Should I see about getting you an engraved invitation?"

"You know, I really wish you wouldn't joke about that stuff."

"Ugh." Mohinder rolled his eyes. "American men and their penetration anxiety."

"That's not what I'm talking about!" Matt threw his chair back, rose to his feet.

"All right, Matt, sit down, it was just a joke. I'm sorry."

Matt wasn't yet awake enough to stay angry. "Yeah, OK." He dumped himself unceremoniously back into the chair. "What were we talking about?"

"Your power." Mohinder pondered the significance of the shape of Cheerios, but chose not to vocalize it. "And brain waves, and radios, and such."

"Right. Reminds me of Hana."

"Who?"

Matt waved his hand dismissively. "You never met her. Never mind."

An eyebrow arched over olive skin. "An old love?"

"Wait. What?" Matt repeated his signature squint, then frowned. "I _really_ wish you wouldn't do that."

"Do what?"

"Constantly make cracks about my love life, or orientation, or whatever. You're always doing it."

Mohinder sighed and pushed away his bowl, folding his arms over his chest. "I'm sorry. I am being a little passive-agressive, I suppose." He lowered his voice, although the cartoons were plenty loud in the other room. "It's just, Matt, I came out to you three weeks ago and you haven't said a word about it since. That is, you told me nothing is going to change and that it doesn't bother you, but you must be thinking something. I wish you'd just be honest about it."

Matt's round face was red. "Oh," he said after a long breath. He rubbed the back of his head nervously. "Look, it's not you, OK? You just told me at... at a weird time for me. You know, everything's falling down all around me, I've lost my job, I've lost my wife, and I'm sort of... at a loss, you know? And then you're all 'You should probably know' and I'm thinking fine, whatever, I'm not really that concerned with _you_ right now. No offense."

"I see." Mohinder was suitably chastened. "I'll add selfish to passive-aggressive, then. My apologies." But he looked gloomy as he got up, scooping up his cup and bowl as he moved toward the sink.

Watching him go, Matt felt a swell of regret. He stood, following Mohinder to the sink. "Hey," he said hesitantly, "look, I'm sorry."

"Don't be," Mohinder said dismissively. "You don't owe me anything."

"Yeah, except a place to live."

"You pay for that, though." There was a sort of dark tone to Mohinder's voice Matt couldn't identify. He'd pledged no mind-reading when he moved in, but it was tempting now. With a clatter of dishes, Mohinder turned to face him. "In the end, I'm just a roommate, Matt. I'm not your friend, and you don't owe me anything."

"Hey, look." Matt grabbed him loosely by the elbows. "I don't think that way, OK? You are a friend. You were the moment you offered me a place to stay. I'm the one who hasn't been a very good friend. I'm sorry."

Mohinder smiled weakly. "It's fine." He left the kitchen, and Matt watched him walk into the living room, ask Molly what she was watching, put the whole conversation behind him. Matt was half-glad; another part of him, though, felt an opportunity may have been lost.

* * *

The truth was, the day Mohinder came out to Matt wasn't the first time Matt had wondered about his sexuality. Actually, his guess had been that Mohinder was asexual. He'd never mentioned a wife or girlfriend, never shown the slightest bit of interest in anything that wasn't on his microscope slides. Except for Molly, of course, but you'd have to be dead not to adore her. She was just that sort of special presence. So it was more out of sympathy that Mohinder offered him a room, Matt figured-- one sailor who'd been drawn in by her song, offering his harbor to a similarly hopeless soul so neither would have to live without her.

Yes, it was obvious to Matt at first that Mohinder was married to his work. He knew the type. Audrey had been one. That's probably why he felt so comfortable working with her; she seemed too businesslike to ever make a move. Upon this thought, though, Matt was sucked into a frenzy of introspection. Why would he assume, just because Audrey was female, that she might hit on him? Had he become that distrusting of women since Janice's betrayal? Was he being completely chauvinist or egomaniacal to think he was worth being hit on? It practically took pliers to pry Matt's eyes out of his navel, he had been gazing at it with such enthusiasm.

Besides, someone who looked like Mohinder had to be single by choice.

What? Matt had eyes in his head. He was allowed to make an observation. He could say the same thing about either member of Brangelina and nobody would blink an eye. What's so wrong with saying it about someone else?

(So maybe he thought the same thing about Thompson back in L.A. A man can meet more than one handsome man in his life.)

But then Mohinder had to go and you-should-probably-know-that-I'm-gay at him. And Matt was a cop in L.A., sure, so he knew from tolerance, but really he was a suburban cop, and that stuff wasn't talked about on his beat. Or during his childhood. He remembered Janice being absolutely steamed at him when he made an offhand comment at a law firm Christmas party about someone being limp in the wrist. She'd been to school at Georgetown; she'd learned something about how to behave in mixed-orientation company. He was just a blue-collar boy. Well, that was his excuse, anyway. It didn't fly with her, as he recalled.

But Mohinder was probably the first person he'd considered a friend who was gay. Matt figured that was probably why he'd noticed. He'd had the same reaction to her he'd had to Audrey: Someone's interested in people like you, and you automatically think that person might be interested in you. It was damned stupid.

And it was an automatic reaction, too, that he drew his hand back when Mohinder's hand touched his during one conversation about Molly and her condition. And that he thought he could feel the impression of that contact on his fingers for hours afterward. And that he sort of felt his throat seize up sometimes when he came home and saw Mohinder asleep on the couch, surrounded by notebooks and loose paper.

It was nothing but collegial admiration, the same he'd had for Dave. Dave was the captain of the wrestling team in high school, and he had just the most amazing grin and when he was on the mat you paid attention, damn it, because there was nothing in your field of vision that even compared with him. But at that point and in that school you were whispered about just for being on the wrestling team, so Matt wasn't sure his experience was a universal one. He'd never talked to anyone about it. Or about the dreams he used to have about him. Those were some pretty uncomfortable dreams.

But maybe, he began to think, Mohinder could give him a frame of reference. Tell him why that had all been perfectly normal. Same with Thompson. Same, for that matter, with Professor Metzger at the community college he'd tired of after a year. His Israeli accent had made the lecture incomprehensible but nonetheless fascinating, and he had the strangest little gestures that Matt used to follow with eager eyes.

He had been trying to get up the nerve to ask about it, but then he'd had a dream about Mohinder.

Yeah, one of those uncomfortable dreams.

* * *

Somehow Mohinder got the radio working later that day, and Matt's proximity didn't seem to break it. So Sunday morning there was classical music and coffee brewing and, to Matt's sleepy surprise, a box of muffins on the table.

"M-morning," Matt yawned, reaching his arms high above his head and hearing his back pop uncomfortably. "What's all this?"

Mohinder had pulled a chair up to the counter and was gazing out the window with a teacup in hand. "I was up early, Molly and I decided we'd had just about enough of Cheerios to last us a lifetime, so we took a trip down to Levin's. I may have let her have a chocolate chip muffin," he admitted with a guilty grin.

"Works for me," Matt said, snagging a blueberry one from the box. "Where is she?"

"We ran into the Gellers on the way back. She wanted to walk their dog with them. It's just around the block, so I said OK."

"Right, that's what's-her-name, Sugar?"

"Honey."

"Too sweet either way." Matt chomped at the muffin and went for the coffee. "So what's this about not liking Cheerios? You could tell a guy."

Mohinder smiled devilishly, his lips hovering just above the rim of the teacup. "Matt, I expect men to be able to read my mind even when they're not psychics. It's a bad habit, I know. It's cost me a boyfriend or two in my time."

The coffee was dark and inviting as it swirled into the cup and Matt wanted to jump in after it and hide from that smile and those implications. "Can't you wait for a man to have some coffee before you start in with that?" he grumbled.

He got the expected roll of the eyes. "That's another problem with me. I can never wait. Explains a lot, doesn't it?"

Matt had no idea what he was talking about but wasn't sure he really wanted to know. He continued to watch Mohinder's lips. They were still curved up slightly and somehow hypnotizing.

Mohinder's eyes darted toward him like a pair of black dragonflies. "What?"

"Nothing, sorry," Matt mumbled, looking down. What _was_ it he'd been looking at, anyway?

A long silence hung in the kitchen, too long and too silent for a Sunday morning. That's right, Matt realized, Molly wasn't here. This was a rare bird, a chance for an adult conversation that wasn't carried on in whispers. "Mohinder," he said awkwardly, "can I ask you a personal question?"

Mohinder cocked his head to the side. The mane of curls bounced. Matt wondered idly what they felt like.

"It depends on the question," he said, "but go ahead."

"How old were you? When you found out."

"Found out what?"

"You know. What you are."

Mohinder scowled. "What I _am_? Matt, I think I know what you're talking about, but I don't define myself by my orientation any more than you do by your ability."

"What?" Matt's skin was prickling, his defenses flying up. "The answer is _I am gay_, so the question is _What are you_!"

"I'm a lot of things," Mohinder answered hotly. "I am a geneticist, I am a citizen of India, I am a Ph.D., I am quite angry with you right at the moment. But none of those things answer the question you asked me."

"Sorry." Matt ate the rest of the muffin in one bite and gulped it down uncomfortably. "You didn't have to go all afterschool-special on me. I get it."

"Good," Mohinder snapped. There was a moment or two of silence. Matt could hear the edges of thoughts whispering around Mohinder's brain, but he dared not probe it any harder. He'd made a promise, after all.

"Hey, so, um...." he started, trying to push himself out from under the sheet of ice that had settled over the kitchen. "So what you were saying yesterday, about frequencies?"

Mohinder nodded wordlessly. He seemed to be concentrating very hard on his tea.

"Um, is there any way to test that? I mean, I think it'd be kind of interesting to find out. How I work, that is."

"Not without a staff and a great deal of equipment, none of which I have," Mohinder answered shortly. "Unless you want me to apply for a research grant, which would involve revealing your talent, which I assume you do not want me to do. So no, there is no way to test it."

"Oh, well." Matt ran the water over his empty coffee cup. The place was so quiet without Molly giggling at her cartoons or Mohinder running off at the mouth about some project or other. And it was his fault. "Look, I'm really sorry, OK? Bad choice of words. It wasn't the first time and it won't be the last, but I will try to learn from it. That's all I can promise, OK? I will _try_ not to be a gigantic ass."

"High school," said Mohinder quietly.

"Huh?"

"I figured it out in high school." Mohinder wandered to the kitchen table, chose a bran muffin, and proceeded to pick the raisins off the surface and pop them in his mouth one by one. "I grew up on a university campus in London, and the subculture at the time wasn't so terribly _sub._ You couldn't look anywhere without seeing all your options. It wasn't a very big leap for me to figure out which appealed to me."

"Wow," Matt said. "That's completely different. I can't even imagine."

"Conservative community, then?"

"Sort of. At least where that sort of thing was concerned."

"I was surprised, upon coming here, to hear how many others had similar upbringings," Mohinder noted, now dissecting the muffin in search of more raisins. "I never heard so many stories of denial."

Matt kind of wanted to ask just how many stories Mohinder had heard, and in what context. Instead, he said, "You know, next time you could just buy a box of raisins."

Mohinder looked down at the remains of the muffin and laughed. "Oh well. Yet another one of..."

"...your bad habits, I'm sure." Matt poured himself another cup of coffee. "Wonder what's taking Molly so long."

"She's probably out catching fleas," Mohinder smiled. Finally, that ease of conversation had returned, and Matt let a sigh of relief escape him. He made a mental note to take better care of his relationship with this man. Mohinder deserved more respect than Matt gave him; besides, when he was mad, the world was freezing cold.

* * *

Wednesday night at midnight, they met unexpectedly in the laundry room in the basement of the building. Each was carrying a bedsheet.

"Don't you dare read my mind," Mohinder stuttered, and he about-faced, making for the staircase.

"Couldn't if I tried," Matt shouted after him. "You're way too smart for me. You think in kilohertz. Too much for my dumbass brain."

By the time he thought to wonder why Mohinder had said that, the scientist was long gone.

* * *

Friday Matt was working the late shift. So after dropping Molly off at school, he went to the store and bought some Raisin Bran. Mohinder was much happier, though he still picked out the raisins when he tired of stomaching the bran part.

Matt had been thinking about this. So hard he swore his brain was ready to boil over. He wanted Mohinder in a good mood-- he did not want to touch him off again. So he waited until Mohinder had some tea and cereal in him, then sauntered to the table with his coffee and toast.

"I was, uh, hoping to talk to you a bit," Matt said, uncomfortable, leaning forward in his seat. "Get your advice on something."

"Sure," Mohinder said easily. "What is it?"

"Well-- the first thing I want to do is apologize," Matt stammered. "Because I didn't say anything for three weeks and now I'm being a _noodge_."

"Oh." Mohinder's eyebrows lifted briefly. "_That_ conversation."

"That...?"

"I've had it before." He waved a hand dismissively at Matt. "Let's get it over with."

"You've... damn it, I can't do anything without ticking you off, can I? I really need your help here, and you're the only person I can talk to about it!"

"I know, I know," Mohinder said wearily. "Go on."

Matt got up, wandered to the radio, turned it on. It was staticky again. "Jeez, maybe I _am_ interfering with this thing," he muttered, clicking it off again. Still facing the counter, he gripped the surface and forced himself to talk.

"How does a guy who's-- in denial-- figure it out? I mean, someone who's never really thought about that possibility?"

Mohinder's answer was almost practiced, coming without hesitation and sounding almost bored. "The same way you figure out you're interested in a woman." Flecks of hurt and annoyance flung themselves outward from his mind to Matt's, but Matt stuck to his promise and refused to follow them to their source.

"But what if you feel totally different around some guys than you ever felt about a woman? That is, what if you think that women are pretty, and you have a good time with them and you can even sleep with them, but then there are some guys you're around and it's like the whole world goes away and you can't breathe? Is that normal? Oh shit, that's the wrong word, I don't mean it's not normal... but..."

Mohinder was silent. Matt glanced back and instantly regretted it; the other man was staring at him open-mouthed with shock in his eyes. "Matt, are you talking about someone in particular that you felt you were attracted to?"

"I never said me!" Matt snapped.

Mohinder sighed. "I have had this conversation before, Matt."

Matt came over to the table, sat down heavily, looked at his big, clumsy hands. "Just... a few people," he admitted. "A guy or two in highschool, a professor in college, a few guys at work. And... um..."

He looked up to see sad eyes. "Don't," said Mohinder. "I know."

"You know?"

"It happens every so often when you come out to someone," Mohinder said. "Especially someone who's not... who's vulnerable, let's say. I've had a lot of straight men confuse coming _out_ with coming _on_ to them. And when you start thinking someone is interested, you start wondering if you're interested back. It's flattering, Matt, but it's not real." He gave Matt a wistful smile that made his heart hurt.

"How do you know it's not real?" Matt asked, the question coming out flat and not at all challenging.

"Because when I gave in and allowed them to use me to experiment with their sexuality, it never ended well. I lost a few very good friends who couldn't look me in the eye after they realized what they'd done. I will not go there anymore."

"Ouch." Matt winced. "I'm sorry. I didn't want to..."

"I know."

"So there's no way I could--"

"People don't come out of the closet in a day, Matt," Mohinder snapped. "It takes years sometimes. And their first relationship is never their happily-ever-after. If you did decide you were interested in me, and I were to get into a relationship with you right off the bat, it wouldn't last, and then we'd be in a hell of a situation here in this apartment. I won't have that." His eyes were starting to line with the red glaze that promised tears to come, and Matt was too rattled to say anything further, much less mention to Mohinder that his feelings for him had started long before Mohinder had come out.

* * *

Saturday morning Matt lay in bed and stared at the ceiling. He was replaying the conversation in his head. He should have avoided telling Mohinder everything. He should have stuck to stories about Dave and Metzger and Thompson. He should have kept it in the past.

But he didn't understand. Mohinder seemed to be several steps ahead of him in the conversation. He was answering questions that hadn't been asked yet. _If_ Matt decided he was gay. _If_ he was interested in Mohinder. _If_ Mohinder was interested too. _If_ they got together. _If_ something went horribly wrong.

It was just like he'd theorized, really. Mohinder was busy thinking in kilohertz, and Matt was trying to read him, and he was getting nothing but garbled static like a radio that wouldn't tune. He just couldn't think on that level. For him, it seemed simple: He'd never before thought that what he felt could be attraction. But now that the possibility was there, it seemed increasingly likely.

Just for kicks, he thought back to Thompson. What would he have thought if it had occurred to him to try to kiss Thompson? To pull that hard, athletic body toward his and put his hands in the tangle of golden hair that always seemed so shiny? To run his fingers down the chest that always seemed just too perfect to be real? To touch another man the way he...

He sat up straight and thought about baseball statistics for three whole minutes.

Then he thought about kissing Mohinder and had to do another five minutes' worth.

_Matt Parkman,_ he said to himself, _you big jackass, you're a gay man. How could you have taken this long to figure this out?_

* * *

When Mohinder left his room late Monday morning and saw the huge bowl of raisins on the table along with the muffin box, he rolled his eyes and nearly went straight back to bed. The smell of the tea was just a little too inviting to resist, though. "Must you do this first thing in the morning?"

"You sound like me," Matt said dryly. He'd taken a chocolate chip muffin.

"I thought those things were too sweet for you."

"Maybe I'm just a sweeter guy than you thought." He gave a wicked grin to Mohinder, who harrumphed uncomfortably and sat.

"So what is it now?" he asked, taking a huge spoonful of raisins and a corn muffin.

"It's thank you," Matt said, making Mohinder's always-expressive eyebrows do another seventh-inning stretch. "For helping me figure myself out. I'm sorry you had to have _that conversation_ again, but I think you may have saved my life with it."

"Ah, I see," said Mohinder, though his eyes and lips were both wavering with a sort of suppressed sadness. "Glad you got things straight."

"In a manner of speaking."

Mohinder shook his head. "That sort of pun gets old."

"I guess I'll find out."

Dark eyes snapped up to his. "What?"

"You know, how the orientation puns get old after a while. I've never been on the other side of it before."

Mohinder got up. His teacup spilled brown liquid onto the tablecloth. "Don't," he said. "I told you not to do this."

"To do what?" Matt's voice flew to a shout. "Figure out what I am?"

"And _that's_ why I know it's not true!" Mohinder shouted back. "It's _not_ what you are."

"But it's part of it," Matt insisted. "You're right, man, I'm a lot of things. I'm a cop, I'm a psychic of sorts, I'm a big ugly Jewish guy, I'm the father of a little girl who's thankfully safe at school and not watching us argue, and I'm gay!" He was shocked a little at how easy the phrase came out of his mouth. "Wouldn't it be stupid to leave that out?"

"Not if it's not true," Mohinder said, biting his lip. "And maybe you can't tell the difference, Matt, but I know these things. I know what you think you're feeling is a fake, and I know that what you want won't work out."

"You know, you know, you know! That's all you said last time we talked about this, was 'you know'! Maybe you don't know, Mohinder. Maybe just this one time, you are wrong. Maybe this _is_ my happily-ever-after. Maybe I don't like you because I think I'm gay, all right? Maybe I think I'm gay because I like you." His voice softened. "Maybe I've liked you for a long time, but it's just now that I've found a name for that feeling. And it's thanks to you that for the first time in my life I really know what it feels like to fall in love."

Mohinder turned to face the wall stubbornly. Matt waited for some motion, something, but it was like a tomb in the kitchen.

"Why won't you say anything?" he asked finally.

No response. Matt felt anger tightening in his chest like a big red fist.

"Do not make me break a promise to you," he said slowly, "but I swear I will read your mind if you don't talk to me."

At this Mohinder spoke, his back still turned. "Don't. Please."

"I don't want to, but I will. I don't know any other way to figure out what you're thinking."

"I can't afford to hear this. I can't afford to have this conversation."

"Why?"

He approached him, put a hand on his shoulder, turned him around. "Mohinder, why?"

His voice broke. "Because it means I will lose you eventually and because that will break my heart!"

There was a long silence. Mohinder's eyes were overflowing with tears. Matt stared at him, dumbstruck.

Then, just very quietly, he said, "But what if you don't?"

"I will." Mohinder was already across the room, wiping his eyes on a paper towel.

"But what if you don't?" Matt repeated insistently. "I mean, that's the same with all relationships, isn't it? You go into it knowing you might get burned."

In answer, Mohinder turned on the radio. Static garbled the sound of violins. "You can't even make this thing work," Mohinder said quietly. "What makes you think you can jump into your first homosexual relationship and it's going to be perfect? It's going to hurt you, too. No matter who it is, it's going to be confusing and you're going to get hurt."

"Then I want it to be you," Matt said into his ear. Strong hands pulled him around and Mohinder was suddenly staring into a face that was very, very close. "I can't imagine being confused and hurt by anyone else." He leaned in.

"Don't," begged Mohinder, putting his hands up to shield his mouth. "You do this and we can't go back."

Matt grabbed both his wrists, forced his arms down. "You didn't tell me you don't want it," he demanded. "Why?"

The gaze faltered. "You know why."

"I want to hear you say it."

"I can't. Read my mind if you need to hear it."

"You're giving me permission?"

A sigh. "I don't have any other choice. You want to know why."

So Matt did.

_Because I want it... because I want you... because I love you and I shouldn't..._

"You're an idiot, Mohinder."

Matt had straightened up. Blindsided, Mohinder stumbled, nearly falling on the kitchen floor. "W-what?"

"Let me get this straight. We both fall madly in love with a child who can't live without either one of us. You help me figure out that I'm gay after a lifetime of denial. We're attracted to each other and we are living together and we have a beautiful child and you _shouldn't_ love me? That's idiotic."

Mohinder stared. It was all he could do. It sounded so simple and fairy-tale when Matt said it, but nothing had ever been simple and fairy-tale in his life...

"Maybe that's why it never lasted."

"What?"

"Maybe the right one is supposed to be simple and fairy-tale. Maybe you just haven't found it yet." Matt tapped his forehead, prompting a gasp of exasperation from Mohinder. "Hey, you never told me to _stop_ reading your mind. Although if you keep thinking in kilohertz I might have to, because your thoughts are so complex they give me a headache."

Despite himself, Mohinder snickered. "But I'm afraid of thinking simply. Because it 'hertz.' "

The gentle laugh that escaped Matt's lips was like a song to Mohinder. "I think the humor may not be genetic after all, doc. We should test our drinking water."

"Damn, that means Molly's infected too." Mohinder's heart was still pounding wildly. Desperately he tried to tamp things back down to humor. "I guess I know what vaccine I'm working on next--"

And then he couldn't be funny any more because Matt had grabbed him by the shoulders and his mouth was on his. Mohinder's eyes fluttered closed; it was too much sensation to take in at once, with the chocolate-laced sweetness of the man's lips and the sort of gingery scent of him and the arms holding him close and the unmistakable sensation that his dreams were coming true. His hands reached out to cup Matt's face, run his fingers through his hair. It felt good. It felt _right._

Their lips parted and Matt said huskily, "See? You can think simply once in a while."

Mohinder nodded mutely. He wanted to believe in this. He needed to. For once in his life, he needed to believe in something he couldn't foresee or estimate or hypothesize the consequences of. The good news was, he thought to himself as he pulled Matt's face down to his again, if he was going to free fall like this, this was the man he'd trust to catch him.

He was broken now. He was done fighting his love for this man. Besides, the static on the radio had finally given way to glorious symphony. Perhaps, once in a while, things really did fall into place.

:end:

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _(Note: these are the notes from the initial posting of this story, in 2007)_  
I thought a lot about what kind of notes I wanted to give this chapter. I basically want to say that this is somewhat a romanticization and extension of a conversation I had with a friend of mine a long time ago, so while the sentiments and the experience might not be universal (and the outcome was very different), it is meant to be a slightly more realistic take on how this relationship might start. Note "slightly more" realistic, not objectively realistic, so ... it is still kind of WAFFy. I hope this doesn't strike anyone as hopelessly inauthentic to the point of being unreadable, and I don't want to characterize the coming-out process as something that is done painlessly. I've seen how painful it can be. But this is still slash, right? So I'm allowed some poetic/romantic license? I dunno, your thoughts are appreciated.


	18. Say ahh/a-n

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This was as simple as breathing.

Matt never cursed in front of Molly. But that evening he came pretty close.

"Hard day?" Mohinder asked as he came home to see Matt trying to massage a kink out of his shoulder. Molly was doing her homework.

"Awful day. I'm so f-" Strike one. "I am so sick of putting up with the sh-" Strike two. "The stuff I do at work. It's like I don't practically run the whole precinct right under my boss's nose. No, I get caught looking at one f---"

Strike three. "Matt!"

"At one Web site and all of a sudden I'm this absolute slacker. I get the job done, don't I? What the hell do they care what I read when I'm waiting for forensics to call me back? Godd-"

"Matt!"

"Argh!" He pounded the table and promptly pulled the same muscle again. "Ow!"

Mohinder raised an eyebrow. "Somebody needs to learn to meditate."

At this, Molly giggled, and Matt snapped, "Who asked you?" It came out rather more mean-spirited than he'd probably intended it, and Mohinder folded his arms and stared at him disapprovingly.

"I'm entirely serious," Mohinder said. "You would be able to control your anger if you had a way of centering yourself."

"Whatever." Matt got up, feeling like his own household was allied against him. Never a moment's peace. Never.

"If you change your mind, don't hesitate to-" Mohinder called down the hallway at Matt's retreating figure, but a bedroom door's slam cut him off.

"I don't think he wants to do that," Molly said, nibbling on the end of her pencil.

Mohinder sighed sadly. "No. I don't think he wants to do much of anything at the moment. Especially take good advice."

Late at night, Matt felt Mohinder's thoughts tap on his mind's door. _Are you feeling any better?_

_Not really,_ Matt telegraphed back. _Can't sleep. Keep beating up on myself for being so stupid. Keep hearing his thoughts telling me my job is on the line._ A moment's pause, and Matt confessed, _The truth is, it's not the first time. He's seen me doing stuff like that before, and he's right, I shouldn't do it ... but now I think he thinks I'm a lazy, no-good jackass, and half of me is mad at him for jumping to conclusions, but half of me thinks he's right and is just praying he doesn't fire me for it._

Mohinder had no reply. Matt felt the silence closing in on him and had to keep going. _Man, I'm sorry. I don't mean to talk your ear off. Or think your brain off, or whatever I'm doing. I just get so full of everyone else's thoughts, it's like mine won't stay inside._

_That's why I think meditation might help you,_ Mohinder responded.

_Chanting Ommm and wearing bedsheets?_

_Not necessarily, although the bedsheets might be a nice touch._ Even through telepathy, there was a hint of a laugh sparkling under each word. _Meditation lets you be alone with your thoughts._

_Doc, I haven't been alone in here since September. Trust me, I've tried._

_And I tried to find a vaccine before I had Claire Bennet's blood,_ Mohinder returned pointedly. _Perhaps you just haven't found the right tools to solve_ your _problem._

And this is why Matt Parkman was now sitting on the floor of his bedroom with his legs crossed, trying desperately to meditate.

"It's a matter of breathing, to begin with," Mohinder said. "Try to be as aware of your breath as you can. Your breath is the essence of you. Become it."

Matt wheezed a few times. "Should I also become the hacking cough I'm trying to beat down?"

"You know, for a telepath you have a remarkable problem with the esoteric."

"You know, for a mild-mannered professor, you've got a hell of a sharp tongue."

Mohinder grumbled. "Just take a few breaths. Close your eyes. See how it works."

"Do I get to say Ommmm?"

"If you must. I prefer a simple Ah, myself."

"Maybe I'll just be quiet, then."

Several minutes later and Matt's backside was starting to get numb. He shifted from hipbone to hipbone awkwardly. It had been relaxing until he'd nearly fallen asleep, doing one of those honking dozes that makes you dizzy when you nearly fall over and wake up with a jolt. Which he did, looking around to get his bearings. His eyes fell on Mohinder, lids closed, palms upturned, murmuring a barely audible "Ahn-" in a voice that seemed too deep to be his. His lips were slightly pursed, his eyelashes fluttering like twin hummingbirds. Matt couldn't help himself. He peeked into his mind.

There was nothing there. It was like reading the Haitian. Wherever Mohinder and his brain had gone was a place so deep that Matt couldn't penetrate it.

That's when he determined to learn how to meditate, even if it killed him. He needed that escape or the world's worries were bound to go crashing down over his head before long.

Easier said than done.

The second time he and Mohinder sat down to practice, Mohinder brought along a CD of music that was supposed to help him relax. Instead, he kept seeing horribly stereotypical belly dancers falling all over themselves in his head and burst into chuckles. Finally Mohinder switched off the music and scowled at him.

"Uh, back to 'Ahn' again?" Matt asked.

"For lack of anything better," Mohinder replied coldly.

Matt tried chanting along with him. Very quietly, so in case Mohinder burst out laughing he could say he didn't realize he was doing it out loud. But being that conscious of how someone is thinking about you does not lend itself to concentration, so Matt got bored. After five or six minutes, he peeked into Mohinder's mind again. To his great satisfaction, he saw the discombobulated belly dancer running around in there as well. She was still there at breakfast the next morning, too-poor Mohinder had the music memorized, so she was stuck in his head, Matt noted with some wicked joy.

The third day was a hard one. There was a gap in the evidence chain that he'd been so painstakingly working on, and his boss had actually said to him that his job was on the line. Worse, Matt had heard him think, _I ought to fire your pansy ass right now. God damn, I wish that funding request would go through so I could get to it. _

He'd spent the whole day feeling like a lost cause, like the sword of Damocles was one budget resolution away from lopping his head clean off. His shoulders ached even more than usual that night, and Mohinder eyed him with pity when he'd tried to massage out the kinks himself. Several times he seemed about to say something, but he never did.

Matt tried to meditate on his own that night. Somehow sitting on his floor and saying "Ah-n" seemed easier when he wasn't half-certain that a well-groomed scientist with a wicked sense of humor wasn't watching him whenever his eyes were closed. But his mind wandered, and before he knew it he was tiptoeing into Molly's dreams, taking a dose of her calmness, and then sliding mentally across the hall to Mohinder's hard-at-work mind.

Well, well. Mohinder's mind was hard at work, but in a surprising way. Matt found himself looking at a picture of their almost-conversation earlier that night, but the image kept resetting itself and replaying with slight variations, like multiple takes of the same movie scene.

> _\-- "Do you need some help with those shoulders?" Mohinder asks, wandering over and putting his hands on Matt's big twisted knots of back. Matt's eyes shut and he groans appreciatively as Mohinder begins to knead. --_
> 
> \-- "I don't suppose you'd let me try to work on that," Mohinder says, coming to stand gingerly behind Matt. Matt nods his assent and the hands get to work. --
> 
> \-- "This may seem inappropriate, but I was always told I was good at massage." Mohinder does not close the gap between them, but Matt groans and turns around, wordlessly daring him to come closer. --

Even lost in his mind-reading, Matt could feel the blood rush to his face. What was Mohinder doing? Worrying about how to approach him? What did that mean? Matt wasn't entirely sure he wanted to contemplate it. He resumed his meditation, his low chant of "Ahh-n," a little louder, trying to drown out inconvenient thoughts and the now absolutely unbearable aching of his shoulders.

The next day, Mohinder asked him point-blank, "Have you been meditating?"

Matt thought at first he'd been caught peeking into Mohinder's mind. But there was no accusatory tone to the words. "Maybe a little," he said evasively. "Why?"

"You seem tense." Mohinder shrugged. "I thought perhaps you might need to try again."

"Do you meditate?" Matt countered. "Or is this just something you teach Americans to make them feel dumb and unenlightened?"

Mohinder gave him a look that could only be described as disdainful. "I learned meditation from a Californian," he informed him. "Surely you're not assuming I'm a yoga master simply because of the color of my skin."

"I deserved that," Matt muttered, trying to pull himself out from the ton of bricks that had just hit him. Mohinder just smiled lightly. "But, um, yeah, I have been. Trying, at least. Maybe not succeeding so much."

"Maybe I can help."

"Yeah. Maybe." He dragged his finger over the countertop lazily. "Not sure how."

"Well, if you wouldn't mind allowing me to observe. Guide you along."

"I don't know about that." He stomped across the room. "Maybe this was a bad idea to start with."

"Or perhaps you just need some assistance. I _am_ trying to help, you know, not make you feel dumb and unenlightened."

"I know, I know," Matt grumbled. "OK, just one more shot. But you can't laugh."

_That_ made Mohinder laugh. Matt looked daggers at him. "I mean it!" But he had the beginnings of a smile on his face, too.

This time Mohinder stayed standing, watching Matt sit on his bed, cross his legs, and close his eyes. "Straighten your back," he whispered, running a hand along Matt's spine. The words fell close to Matt's ear, and he shivered. "Now, breathe in. Feel the breath fill your belly, your lungs, your heart. Like sunlight. The air you're breathing in is clean. And then exhale all the impurities right out of you. All the darkness, all the thoughts you don't want to have-- out they go. Like a cloud of smoke." Matt exhaled heavily.

"And again, clean, clear breath in. Through your stomach, your lungs, your heart." The voice was half-whisper, half-chant. "Out with all that you don't need. From the tips of your fingers through to the heart of you, everything out."

Matt inhaled and exhaled several more times, Mohinder coaching him. For the first time, this felt as relaxing as he'd hoped it would. His head felt light, and his back had forgotten to ache. "I feel good," he said in a small voice, his eyes still closed.

"Good," Mohinder echoed. "You are all clean inside. There is only light inside of you, no darkness." It was like listening to an angel tell a fairy story. The hushed, airy tones seemed to vibrate through him. "Now it is time to begin."

_Begin?_ Matt thought, but he kept the thought to himself. He was too relaxed, too deep in the thrall of Mohinder's voice to become skeptical now. He was willing to see this through.

"Now, breathe in the air that will become your mantra. Imagine it forming in the depths of your lungs, finding voice, then coming out so very slowly. In, deep, and--"

"Ahh-n," chanted Matt in an even tone. The sound spilled out of him like the sun's rays through a slatted blind-- faint, but unmistakably light. He felt as though he were in a white room, small and quiet but open. Everything had lost its color. His hair had no color. His skin was transparent. He was wearing pristine white robes. The whole world was white.

When he reached the bottom of his breath, Matt opened his eyes. "Wow," he said. "I felt-- I felt myself _go_ somewhere that time."

"Excellent." Mohinder was glowing too, but in a different, slightly yellower color. Everything still looked a little pale. "Continue."

Matt nodded, inhaled, chanted again. Mohinder's smile was imprinted, gleaming, on the back of his eyelids now, but he tried to breathe it out and away. He wanted to go back to that clean, white box, wanted to live there all alone. He wanted to stop wanting so hard and just _be_.

It took longer to come this time, but the oblivion came, and Matt felt released, felt as though he could walk a thousand miles and never reach the corners of that white room. Perhaps this was the power of his mind turned on himself, but Matt felt free, like he'd found a place that he'd been searching for.

Mohinder. Mohinder was responsible for this, for showing him this. Matt nearly reached out to pull him into the dream, but reconsidered. No reason to scare him. Mohinder still wasn't aware of what exactly Matt could do. Matt had been too busy, or too concerned for their health after learning what they'd been through, or just plain too cowardly to tell him. He would, of course, but this was not the way. Instead, he peeked out of a window he painted in that white wall and looked into Mohinder's mind.

He saw himself, deep in meditation. He saw Mohinder smiling with satisfaction at having taught him so well. And he saw in the back of Mohinder's eyes another movie reel playing. It seemed to be his particular brand of thinking things through-- like a chess master who analyzes every slight variation until he reaches his perfect outcome. Matt leaned a little further out his mental window and peered into the projection booth.

> _\-- Mohinder leans down to caress the face that is so rapt. Matt's eyes slit open. They share a moment of intense eye contact, and then Mohinder leans in closer --_
> 
> \-- Mohinder caresses his cheek, and Matt's eyes open. And Matt grabs his wrists and pulls him down atop him --
> 
> \-- Mohinder places a soft daffodil of a kiss on the corner of his mouth. Eyes open, and they stare at each other --
> 
> \-- Mohinder whispers something in his ear, and Matt's arms snake around him. His eyes never open; Mohinder's close instead --

Matt could have stared at those myriad variations for forever and a half. They were fascinating. Mohinder in sepia tones, and Matt in black and white, meeting at the limits of the spectrum. At the center of the world. Were there practical considerations? Surely, on the edges of this place. But Matt was at his center, gazing from core to core, and the cores were right. Surely all the roughness around the edges could be smoothed out in time. This was as simple as breathing.

He breathed in a long breath, letting it rise through his stomach, his lungs, his heart.. And at the crest of the breath, he opened his eyes.

He saw a somewhat goofy smile slide off Mohinder's face. There was no dizziness when he rose to his feet, although looking at Mohinder now, with the certainty of what he was seeing, was a vertigo-inspiring experience. How had he been blind to all the obvious signs? The beauty in the eyes, the delicate curves and straight lines all in their place? Why had he needed to go so deep within himself to figure out what should have been clear on the surface?

The edges weren't rough. The edges were _glorious._

Matt took his hands. Mohinder gasped at the contact. His eyes asked a quavering question, and Matt answered with a smile.

"You saw," Mohinder whispered, trying in vain to sound horrified. But there was too much joy in his eyes to make it convincing.

"I looked at myself, too," Matt said. Their voices were both barely above whispers. "You'll never guess what I found."

Inexplicably, Mohinder turned away, his eyes brimming with tears. "You don't. We can't."

It was just a little too perfect, a little too beautiful, and Matt felt the ethereal nature of the moment tumble into a flood of rather more earthly sensations. "OK, Mohinder," he smirked. "I'm pretty clear-headed right now, BUT. If you keep with the we-can't-we-mustn't? I might lose it and tackle you."

"I never said 'we mustn't'!" Of all the times to protest a cliché!

"Good. Because we _must._" The phrase came at the same time as Matt's hand, then lips, on his lips. Mohinder sucked in a breath, drawing cold air across both their mouths. Matt shivered and drew him into an embrace, fever supplanting chills. They both sighed into the kiss, and broke away with a small exhalation of "ahh-n."

"I take back what I said," Matt muttered low into the side of his face. "I might just tackle you anyway."

Fingers were small and insistent on his waist. "That's not good," said a honey-colored voice near Matt's ear, though the sweetness of the tone told him it was very good indeed.

"Yeah. I have no control. I need to learn some-- I don't know, meditation or something."

"I don't know anything about that," Mohinder whispered. "I might have a passing familiarity with some tantric yoga techniques, however."

"Yoga? I _never_ would have guessed," Matt chuckled. "So what's tantric yoga about?"

Lips pressed into his neck. "Have you ever heard of the Kama Sutra?"

At that, Matt growled and reached down with every intention of scooping the man up into his arms and dumping him unceremoniously on the bed. But one agonizing shout of pain later and he was alone on that bed, clutching his poor pulled shoulder.

"Perhaps we should take this a little more slowly, then?" Mohinder tried desperately not to laugh.

"Would you give a guy a little help here?" Matt wailed.

Mohinder smirked. "Somebody needs more practice." He settled onto the bed behind Matt and began rubbing his shoulders. "Find your center," he whispered.

Matt did. And Mohinder didn't leave that bed until the next morning.

:end:


	19. red/aka

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Apologies to any Republican readers I may have out there. Spoilers through 2x11.

He'd returned home a changed man. It had been a joyful reunion, to be sure, and the moment when Molly flew into his arms had been just as heart-lifting as he'd hoped, but Matt was different. There was a purpose behind his eyes that Mohinder had not seen before.

Some of it was obvious. After hearing what had happened to them, he'd resolved never to leave Molly again. He would stay around, be a good father, take care of her, provide for her. And after hearing what had happened in Texas, Mohinder understood that Matt had been through hell and back. He'd listened to the story of what they'd discovered, how they'd resolved to take everything public, to stop visiting the sins of the fathers on the younger generation, and then how that resolution had been shot through the heart with four bullets.

"What is it about four bullets, anyway? Will they be haunting me the rest of my life?" he said aloud once when he thought no one was listening.

But Mohinder had his own cross to bear. Sylar was back, and sooner or later he might return for Molly. Matt insisted that he was ready for him this time, that Sylar, with all the abilities he'd amassed on his killing sprees, had never shown any signs of telepathy or persuasion, and that rendered him vulnerable to Matt's newfound powers of suggestion. But more than even his fear, Mohinder was wracked by guilt about Niki's death. Had he been able to get the vaccine to her in time, had he not hesitated in California but done what needed to be done, had he left Bennet for dead and had the remainder of Claire's blood still available-- if he had made just slightly different choices, Niki would have been cured, would have had her strength, would have been able to escape that conflagration. But he'd made exactly the wrong decisions. And that killed him a little bit each time he thought about it.

One of the first things he'd done was inquire after Micah. He'd been assured that the boy was well cared for, had family in the area, and was being monitored by the Company, just in case.

"Just in case what?" he'd asked, horrified (as he was periodically) at Bob's methodical tone.

"In case the trauma of losing his parents causes him to make some bad choices. Micah is a very special boy, Doctor. It would be a shame to see his abilities go to waste." It was the cold smile that threw Mohinder. Bob sometimes reminded him of a crocodile.

"I'd like to go see him," said Mohinder. "To offer my condolences." And, he added inwardly, to let him know whose fault it was that his mother was dead.

"I don't know if that would be such a good idea, Doctor." The way Bob said the word "Doctor," with a sort of click of the jaw between syllables, was downright creepy. "We were actually hoping you'd be able to go down to Texas and see what you could do about Nathan Petrelli. His brother's blood should be sufficient to synthesize a serum that might help him recover."

And then Bob leaned over and said, "We also think it's a good idea for you to go as a representative of the Company. To let Mr. Petrelli know that the Company does, after all, have his best interests at heart."

At that moment, Mohinder knew who was behind the shooting. He made plans to fly to Texas, but he booked the return flight through New Orleans.

* * *

"Hey, Matt." Molly was at the computer. Matt was trying to write something down, but he kept muttering and scratching letters out. "Is it true that that guy was shot by animal rights activists?"

"What?" The question had come out of left field to hit him in the eye.

"That's what this Web site says. But that doesn't make sense, because if you are into animal rights you also think a person is an animal, so you wouldn't hurt them, right?"

"What Web site is this?" Matt left his seat, came up to stand beside her. "Redstate.org?"

Molly shrugged. "I just did a blog search for Nathan Petrelli and came up with it. People on this site think he has some information about the president and she had him shot because of it."

Matt laughed. "Wow. They are _so_ wrong."

"They usually are on this site," Molly said disdainfully. "But it's kind of funny. Look, there's a whole section here on why evolution isn't real."

"Mohinder would love that," Matt mused.

"Yeah. You should see some of the stuff they're coming up with." Molly scrolled through the pages of speculation. Matt caught the phrases "liberal media" and "communist" and "New York City libtards" but didn't bother concentrating hard enough to read the rest.

"Can't be any weirder than the truth," he muttered.

"I dunno," Molly said. "There's always something about aliens, too. Did you meet any aliens in Texas?" She grinned.

"Hah! Maybe I did, squirt. You never know." Matt ruffled her hair and didn't bother telling her that those weren't the kind of aliens the blog was likely writing about.

* * *

An elderly woman with the regal air of a queen answered the door at the Dawson house. Her back was straight and her eyes sparkling. "Can I help you?" she asked with a genial smile.

"My name is Doctor Mohinder Suresh. I worked with Niki Sanders. I was hoping to speak with her son."

"I haven't seen Micah today," she said apologetically. "He's been a tough little kid over the past few weeks, but it's hard for him. You know."

"Of course," Mohinder said uncomfortably. "In that case, might I..."

"Doctor Suresh?"

The voice behind him was bright, jubilant, youthful. Mohinder turned.

Monica was looking just as radiant as she had when they first met. But she seemed leaner, more toned, and Mohinder couldn't help but wonder if she'd been more active in the use of her gift. "Miss Dawson. Nice to see you again."

"You too, Doctor! What's goin' on? What are you doin' back here?"

"Back?" The elderly woman's eyes turned sharp and cold. Mohinder instinctively reached out for and caught Monica's elbow. Somehow he knew it would be a bad idea for this woman to know the Company had contacted Monica.

"I was hoping to speak with Micah," Mohinder said. "Would you know where I could find him?"

"Micah said he had to go away for a few days," she answered, tipping her head to the side. "He said someone was coming to town he had to meet. Oh, don't worry, Doctor. He's a good kid. He stays in touch, too. You can always get him on e-mail."

* * *

The previous night, Matt had been on the phone with Peter Petrelli. Nathan was still in a coma, and although Mohinder had come by earlier that day to attempt to prepare an infusion of Peter's blood, the potency of the regenerative gene seemed to be lost in translation; it wasn't enough to rouse him. It was a huge disappointment for all involved.

But Peter was adamant. He did not want to give up on his brother's wish to see their parents' deeds exposed, no matter who was hunting them down. Matt tried to talk him down, told him he'd never be free again. If his particular brand of power was exposed, he'd be in a secret prison in some country ending in "-stan" in no time at all.

"Maybe I'm not the one to tell everyone, then. Maybe someone else needs to do it. Maybe it's you who needs to say it. Or Mohinder, since he has the evidence."

"Mohinder's out of bounds," Matt insisted. "We... Molly needs him too much. He goes public with this kind of information, she's in even more danger."

"Somebody's got to step up!" Frustration and fatigue were clashing in his tone. How many nights had Peter stayed up at his brother's bedside, trying to find the answers? Matt felt a flood of sympathy for him. He'd done just as much soul-searching, but the possibility of pulling down this house of mysteries seemed remoter every day.

"I know, I know," he muttered. "We'll figure it out."

Peter's voice softened. "You're a nice guy, Matt," he said. "I think I know why Mohinder speaks so highly of you."

"He does?" Matt had been sure Mohinder never wasted a word on him.

"Sure. He says how good you are for Molly, how happy she is to have you there with her. She sounds like a handful. Mohinder said maybe I could come over and meet her when this is all done."

Matt's heart sank. "I suppose, yeah. That'd be nice." He was trying to convince himself that what upset him was the prospect of Peter, who could be so easily manipulated, absorbing Molly's power. That it made him just a little too powerful for comfort. It had nothing to do, he was sure, with how long Mohinder was taking to get home and how easily and freely it seemed he was able to talk with Peter. Apparently they'd met before, and the meeting had been momentous. Life-changing, Peter had enthused one night when Matt had dared ask about it. Matt wasn't sure what disturbed him so much. Maybe because he hadn't had that moment of life-changing certainty that Mohinder seemed to inspire in everyone else he met.

* * *

Mohinder was unbelievably depressed on the plane home from New Orleans. Other than an unexpected reunion with Peter Petrelli, nothing good had come of his visit to Texas, and his stop by New Orleans had been just as fruitless. He opened his laptop and pulled up a spreadsheet program to start reviewing work. It was all blurring before his eyes, though. Until a window poped up on his screen.

_R U DR SURESH?_

"What?" Mohinder said aloud. The lady sitting next to him scowled and tried to go back to sleep.

Unsure exactly what was going on, he opened a blank text file and typed into it.

_Who are you? __

A moment later the letters came up one by one:

_monica said u were looking for me. __

This was impossible. They were 30,000 feet in the air. Wireless communication was prohibited in flight.

_why r u lookin 4 me?_ It was as if someone had remote access to his keyboard and was typing while his eyes were closed.

_Are you Micah Sanders?_ he typed.

_Y._

_How are you doing this?_

_its what i do. why r u looking 4 me?_

Mohinder sighed. _I knew your mother,_ he typed. _I'm sorry._

_Mom is__ The cursor stopped, then erased the two words, started again. _Y R U LOOKIN FOR ME???_

_Just to see if you are all right,_ Mohinder typed nervously.

_I DONT BELIEVE U._

Mohinder thought about the vaccine and Sylar and Bennet. _There is something I want to talk to you about, but I'd rather do that in person,_ he typed.

_ok cu on the ground._

Mohinder peered into the aisle. No other laptops were open, no cell phones being typed into. There was an iPod or two, but that was it. How was he doing this?

_Micah, are you still there?_ he typed, but there was no response.

* * *

His bad luck continued at the baggage claim: There was no sign of his suitcase. Scowling thunderclouds, Mohinder marched toward the customer service desk, ready to raise holy hell. Then he felt a tug on his sleeve.

A grinning, angelic face framed by a ring of tight black curls stared up at him. "Here's your bag," said the boy, whose skin was a creamy copper color. "I saw it was yours and figured it'd be a good way to make sure I met you."

Mohinder grabbed the suitcase and the child in one motion, shuttling them both to the periphery of the crowded room. "Micah? What are you doing here? How did you get here? How did you get on my computer?" he hissed.

In answer, the boy picked up the iPod clipped to his belt and tilted the display toward Mohinder. As he watched, the screen faded and then lit up with eight large letters:

LIKE  
THIS

Mohinder's jaw dropped.  


* * *

When the latch clicked, Matt went for his gun.

"Oh, for God's sake, that's the second time you've done that to me," Mohinder grumbled after nearly dropping his suitcase on his toes.

"Sorry. Still thinking about..." The name went unsaid. Matt turned to put the gun away.

"Hi, Micah!" Molly yelled from across the room. The elfin face peered out from behind Mohinder and waved silently. Both men gaped.

"What's he doing here?" Matt asked.

"You knew he was coming?" Mohinder asked.

"It's called e-mail, DUH," Molly said and grabbed Micah's hands, showing him in. Matt and Mohinder faced each other as they went running through the small kitchen.

"What could I do?" Mohinder said in a hushed voice, walking over to Matt. "He stowed away on the plane. He's just lost his mother. I'm not about to turn him away."

"The more the merrier. Hey, look at all the room we have here." Matt's eyes were slitted.

"I didn't say he was moving in," Mohinder hissed.

"Good, 'cause he's not."

"I'll remind you that this is my apartment!"

At this, Matt fell silent.

"I'm sorry," Mohinder sighed. "It's been a long flight."

"I know, man." Matt clapped a hand to his shoulder. "We've all been through hell."

"Yes, and you're just being protective. I appreciate that." Mohinder rubbed his bleary eyes with one hand.

Matt smiled. Somehow that meant a lot. "Tell you what. Why don't I order some pizza for us all."

Molly and Mohinder looked up at him simultaneously.

"_Vegetable_ pizza," Matt insisted.

* * *

Micah was the sort of kid you expected to be the class clown in better circumstances. Even now, he kept up with the conversation, shakily dropping jokes in when he could. But the effort he was expending to keep from crying was slowly breaking Matt inside. He looked at the two kids, who, when they weren't eating, were stubbornly holding hands, and envied their ability to find simple solace in each other's company. A confederacy of orphans under the amateur guidance of a pair of false fathers. What an odd foursome they made. The four "M"s.

"I spoke to Peter Petrelli the other night," he informed Mohinder.

He nearly choked on his pizza. "D-did you?"

"He said you changed his life."

"Well." Mohinder blushed. A baby smile played across his lips. "That's flattering, but I'd say he rather changed mine."

Matt resented Peter even more for this admission of Mohinder's. And he resented himself for not knowing what it meant.

* * *

After dinner, Mohinder wanted to talk to Micah alone, but Micah insisted Molly be there. So they gave up the pretense and all four of them sat down. Micah and Molly's hands were still clasped together anxiously. Mohinder began. "I wanted to tell you about the virus your mother had."

Micah's eyes glazed over with tears almost immediately. Matt had grabbed a box of tissues; he tossed it over. Mohinder smiled at him appreciatively. Matt's heart gave a funny thump when they locked eyes, and he cleared his throat and looked away.

"It took away her power," Micah said slowly. "And that's why she couldn't escape."

"Yes," Mohinder said. "But there are some things you should know about how your mother got that virus. It wasn't something she picked up on the street. It was manufactured. By the company she worked for. The company I work for."

Micah got up. If it hadn't been for Molly's insistent hand grasping his, he might have taken a swing at Mohinder.

"It was a horrible time, and she was fighting as hard as she could to keep herself healthy for you," Mohinder said, his own eyes red but his gaze solid. "Sadly, she infected herself thinking that I could cure her. But the strain had mutated, and my blood was no longer able to do so."

"She said you were going to find a cure," Micah said, his tears overflowing. "She believed in you."

"I did find a cure." It was Mohinder's only statement in his own defense. "But I wasn't able to get there in time. I'm sorry." He hung his head.

"How can you work for them?" Micah demanded angrily. "What kind of company makes diseases that kill people?"

"A company we're trying to stop," interrupted Matt. "We're trying to expose them, make it impossible for them to hurt anyone again."

"How!?" Micah demanded.

"We're not... really sure yet," Matt finished lamely. "We'd wanted to go on TV and tell people everything. That's what Nathan was going to do. But they... silenced him. And they made it pretty clear that they'll do the same thing to anyone who tries to tell the public what they know."

This made Molly jump into his arms and whisper pleas into his ear. "Don't do anything, don't go, please don't leave me again, please please please..."

But Micah's smile had returned. "Then don't _tell_ them anything," he said simply.

* * *

Several minutes later they were all standing in front of the computer. Micah had his hand on the tower, which was humming happily-- it really sounded happy, Matt marveled-- at him. "So," he started with that cherubic grin, "What do you want to call the site?"

"Um..." Matt still wasn't sure exactly what they were doing, but he knew it had some resemblance to Molly's "red state" page. "Red.... Red File. The Red File."

Micah closed his eyes. "It's available. Theredfile.com. OK? I'll snag it." The computer blipped, and a series of quickly loading Web pages shuffled across the screen. "I'm routing it through a bunch of dummy servers so it will be hard to trace. And I've asked one of the servers on the inside half of the chain to let me know if anyone starts poking around the line, so I can re-route the server trail."

Matt stared at him. "Which in English means..."

"No one will be able to tell it's us making the page," Molly chimed in. "So you're safe."

"Now for the fun part," Micah said. "What do you want it to look like?"

"I don't know, a red file?" At this Mohinder laughed; Matt glared at him. But Micah just closed his eyes. The computer whirred, and in the browser window appeared a red file folder against a black background.

"I won't be able to do this all the time," Micah said. "But I can set you up and optimize your search engine placement, and Molly can plant the seed on a few blogs, so you should get plenty of traffic. And I'll show her the system when I'm done, so she can help you update it and add photos and blog posts and stuff."

"I get the feeling they don't trust us," Matt stage-whispered to Mohinder. "Do you get that feeling? I'm hurt. I think I'm going to pout." Mohinder's eyes sparkled, and he grinned. Matt felt a little ridiculous for how happy it made him. As for Molly, she had to double over, she laughed so hard. For a moment they felt like a normal family again.

Mohinder turned to Micah. "I think that, of all the people I've come across and all the abilities I've encountered, yours might be one of the most fascinating. So you're able to command it to program itself?"

"Well, I know HTML. And Java and Flash and most content-management systems. So I could do it manually," Micah explained matter-of-factly. "But yeah, that's basically it."

"You hear that, Molly? We're not fascinating enough for these two. I say we ditch the geniuses and have some fascinating ice cream." Matt threw up his hands melodramatically and turned on his heel, about to stomp away. Molly giggled harder.

_\--pretty damned fascinating yourself, just for a different reason--_

Matt turned. Mohinder blushed, and his mind went blank. Matt frowned and opened his mouth to speak.

Micah spoke instead. "OK, it's ready," he announced. "What do you want it to say?"

* * *

  
Welcome to  
**THE RED FILE**.com  
maintained by the M4 Group

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* * *

Matt tiptoed into the room. The glow of the screen was slightly pink against Mohinder's face, and his glasses reflected small boxes, text and details flickering in miniature. "You should have seen them," Matt whispered. "Micah started crying when he thought I was gone, and our girl was so strong. She said to him, 'It gets easier, I promise it does.' "

"She's been through so much. Too much," Mohinder said, turning to smile at Matt. His bones were so delicate, Matt noted. The dim, rose-colored lighting was throwing the high cheekbones into exquisite relief, and though Matt didn't know any of those words for it, he knew he was unable to look away.

"Yeah. But this is the kicker. She said to him, 'Any time you need some extra family, come on up and I'll lend you my dads.' "

Mohinder's smile was five miles wide. "She said that?" Matt nodded. "Wow. Has she even called us dads before? Besides the apron, of course." He was absolutely befuddled with delight, tickled pink by the monitor and the concept.

"So what are you working on?" Matt leaned over his shoulder at the screen.

"I'm composing some text for the introduction," Mohinder said. "I think people ought to know what they can and can't expect from us."

"Hey, uh, Mohinder?" Matt was fairly certain he was blushing. He hoped it would be mistaken for the screen's red glow. "What happened between you and Peter?"

Mohinder was blindsided. He gawked at Matt.

"I mean, he told me you changed his life and then you said he changed yours, and I wasn't sure-- it seemed like something--"

"Peter made it all real," Mohinder said quietly. His eyes were shimmering behind the glasses. Matt fell silent.

Mohinder got up, walked around to the back of the chair to face Matt. "I came to New York convinced of my father's research," he narrated. "But it was blind faith. Idealism. Then Peter showed up at my door and I thought for the first time I'd been misled, and I doubted myself for the first time, and I was able to return and look at it all like a scientist, and that's when it was all real. Everything Peter had told me he could do was real, and suddenly the proof was right there, and I was finally in the middle of that world that I'd prayed and dreamed could exist right under my nose. I might still be driving a taxi and chasing madness if it weren't for him. Instead, I spend every day of my life studying the people my father had made it his life's work to find, helping them, being the one person who can explain to them who and what they are. One knock on my door. Yes, I'd say that qualifies as changing my life."

Matt didn't know what to say. He felt stupid and boorish and not entirely sure what he'd been accusing Mohinder of, anyway, but damned ashamed of having done so. He sucked in a long breath and held it, trying to summon the courage to apologize.

"And I was rather attracted to him, as well," Mohinder added casually.

Matt spit all over the carpet.

Coughing, he banged on his chest, trying to get some equilibrium back. "You we-- w--- what?"

"Are you jealous?" Mohinder asked, tiny, wicked upward slants at the corners of his mouth.

"No, I'm not jealous!" Matt burst out. "So what did you write? Let me see."

"Because if you were jealous, I'd tell you not to be."

Matt pretended not to hear. He deposited himself heavily in the chair before the computer and tried in vain to read the text on the screen. "All we have st-- sw--" he stammered.

_He wasn't actually my type to start with._

"Do you _mind_?" Matt turned around in the chair and got an extreme Mohinder close-up, as the man had leaned down and was now grinning at him barely a few inches away. Suddenly there was no air in the room. Matt wheezed. Had it always been this hard to be around Mohinder? Cerebral, frustrating, annnoyingly perfect Mohinder, who could do no wrong? Who could do calculus in his head and cook everything without burning a thing and speak three languages and look just as good in pajamas as he did a tuxedo, and--

Oh, crap.

He turned back around, and fast. "What does it say?" he asked through a tightly clamped jaw.

He could practically hear Mohinder's smile. A pair of hands came down, hot and claustrophobia-inducing, on his shoulders. "It says the following."

"We are all searching for answers. To who we are, why we are, what we are capable of, unto ourselves and along with our fellow man. How far can we go? If we are able to realize our fullest potential, what great feats might we be capable of? There may be answers out there for those brave enough to seek them, but that is not our mission. We at the Red File are merely keepers of the questions. We leave finding the answers to you."

The computer hummed, but there was no other sound in the room when the gentle cadence of Mohinder's voice trailed into nothing. Matt felt as though he'd just heard a symphony. He wasn't sure if he was supposed to applaud.

Then Mohinder's voice returned, gentle but tentative. "What do you think?"

"Think? I think you ought to do voiceovers." Matt grinned. "It's perfect. I have a feeling Peter would approve."

"You really are a little jealous," Mohinder laughed.

Matt got up and looked around. This place was his home, and for the first time since he'd returned, he felt like it was all right to relax and just be home. He'd done what he needed to do; he'd put the questions out into the public sphere. And now he just had to have enough faith in his fellow man to follow their trail to the answers. It was enough of a first step.

Mohinder yawned, and Matt realized how late it was. "We ought to hit the sack," he said. "We have to take Micah to the airport in the morning."

"Yes," nodded the sleepy scientist. He clicked the mouse a few times and switched off the monitor. Red disappeared into the blueness of dark. The anonymity of darkness was comforting, and Matt felt something in him grow bold.

"Hey, uh, Mohinder?" he said. "I was. A little."

"A little?"

"Jealous." He grinned ruefully. "It's not the first time I've wondered about it, to be frank."

"What, about me and Peter?" Mohinder asked.

"No. About you and..." He stopped, suddenly aware of the beating of his heart in his throat. "Forget it."

Mohinder's eyes were glimmering, twin lights in the dark stretch of quiet. "Good night," he said.

* * *

The first hits started coming in shortly thereafter. Molly understood the statistics program and rattled off the list of countries from which people were visiting. Sri Lanka, she said, Myanmar, Singapore. (Mohinder seemed particularly impressed and thought some random things about foreign policy that Matt didn't quite get.) It wasn't long before posts started popping up on the forum, too. Most were of the tenor of "WHAT IS THIS SITE" and "WEIRD," and a fair number contained words Matt and Mohinder didn't want Molly to see. But she was the one who first wrote the simple response, "We will delete offensive posts -The M4 Group" and went through doing just that. Maybe she wasn't innocent, Matt thought with more than a little pride, but the girl had taste.

Mohinder learned how to moderate the forum pretty quickly and took over duties from Molly, stopping by every evening to delete the refuse. "Molly says that in a few months we'll have an idea of which users can be trusted, and we can outsource forum moderation to them," he said to Matt. "Really, these children live in something of a different world from the one we grew up in."

Matt smiled. "So did we, when we were children."

"That is very true." Mohinder got up, put a hand on Matt's shoulder, smiled, and walked away. Matt thought for a whirling moment that the world was a very different place than it had been five seconds ago.

* * *

Peter Petrelli came over for dinner the following week. Matt put aside his resentment and welcomed him in, and Molly was charming, as usual. But when Peter insisted on helping Mohinder cook, and Mohinder put on _his_ apron, Matt started to feel antsy. What was worse, Peter picked up on it. Halfway through the conversation, he put up a mental shield around the two of them so Matt couldn't "eavesdrop." Annoyed, he paced in the living room, looking up every so often to see the two of them laughing and muttering in hushed voices. When Molly wandered through, she made the casual observation, "Wow. That's almost too much pretty for one room." Matt stared at her a moment, then looked at the pair and, with a sinking heart, decided he agreed.

But dinner was good, a sort of Indian-Italian fusion cuisine where spicy saffron and rich marinara melded into a thick orange residue on all their plates. Molly complained loudly that her tongue was on fire, that she needed something icy and smooth to cool it down. Everyone saw through it, and when Matt brought her a tall glass of ice water, to her obvious disappointment, she was forced to admit, "I was thinking maybe ice cream."

"I know what you were thinking." Matt tapped his forehead meaningfully. She pouted. Peter was in stitches.

"I really needed this," he said at one point. "You can go crazy down there, in a hospital in a city you don't know, waiting for something to happen that never does. It's like being frozen. It's really nice to get back to something like normal, even if just for a night."

"I can imagine." Mohinder reached out and squeezed his hand on the table. Matt felt his throat get tight. But then Peter shot Mohinder a warning look, and he withdrew his hand. A little too late to hide it, Matt thought angrily.

"Oh! Oh, I meant to tell you!" Peter suddenly snapped his fingers. "There's someone out there who's doing the same thing we are, trying to expose the Company. I couldn't beleive it when I saw it, but there's this Web site. The Red File. Whoever runs it knows all about the Company and all the things they've done."

Molly clapped her hands over her mouth. Mohinder leaned forward. "Really?" he said, sounding truly surprised. "Where did you find it?"

"It was on the news!" Peter said. "Just a local station in Texas, but they were going on about 'What company is the site talking about'? And I realized it had to be Primatech because there was an item on there about Nakamura, too. Hiro's dad, the one who was killed."

_Don't let on,_ Mohinder shot mentally in Matt's direction. But that was his mistake, because Peter's jaw dropped, and he stared in utter shock at the pair of them. "It's you?" he said.

"He can hear thoughts too, genius." Matt harrumphed and got up, grabbing up his and Molly's plates and stomping to the sink.

Mohinder smiled embarrassedly. "Don't ask me what crawled up his pants and died there."

"But it is you, isn't it?"

He shrugged. "The secret is out."

"That's incredible! Who came up with it?"

"Micah Sanders, actually," Mohinder said. "He's the fourth M in the 4M Group."

"Who's that?"

"He's the young son of a former co-worker. You... never knew her." Even over the running water, Matt could hear the sorrow in his voice. He sighed.

"I love the idea of a 'red file,'" Peter said. "It's very intriguing. Whose idea was that?"

"That was Matt's creation." To Matt's great surprise, Mohinder's voice was glowing with pride. "He has run the whole thing, really. He's very good at figuring out just how much of a clue to give people."

"But why give clues?" Peter asked. "Why not just tell everyone the truth?"

"You know the answer to that," Mohinder said darkly.

Matt heard Peter take in a sharp breath. "...Oh."

"So that's why the site provides no answers. But the idea is that people will find the answers themselves..."

"...if they know the right questions." Hearing this, Matt scrubbed the plate he was working on a little harder. Did they have to finish each other's _sentences_?

Abruptly, Peter burst out laughing. "Mohinder, excuse me for a few minutes." He came toward Matt in the kitchen and dropped his plate in the sink, then picked up a dishtowel and began to dry the silverware Matt had already finished with. Matt did his best to keep his thoughts incoherent and stormcloudy. With any luck, he'd drive him away.

"He's crazy about you, you know," Peter said suddenly.

Matt dropped the glass he'd been washing; Peter gave it a good look, and it paused in midair and then gently splashed into the water below. A few bubbles popped into the air. "Watch it," Peter said.

"Wh-- wha--- wha---" It was all of a sudden so, so hot in there. Matt wanted to dunk his head in the dishwater.

Peter laughed. "What are you, deaf? Mohinder. He wants you in the worst way. It's hysterical to watch you two run rings around each other."

"Stop messing with my head!" Matt exploded. "I have no idea what you're talking about!"

"Which is why you're red as a beet," Peter said slyly, his small eyes narrowed to slits.

"Look, you've obviously got the wrong impression," Matt grumbled, leaning forward and turning the running water up, just in case. "But I guarantee you, he's all yours if you want him. I'm not making any trouble."

"Me!?" Peter was incredulous. "What on earth would I want with.... ha!" He laughed loudly, throwing his head back, as Matt desperately yelled _stop, stop, shut up, shut up!_ into his mind.

"It's pretty obvious from the way you two talk," Matt said. "It's fine. Really. As long as Molly has a stable home."

"I would have an easier time believing that if you would stop imagining squashing me like a bug."

"I'm not--" He was, though. He _so_ was.

"Besides," Peter said, grabbing another dish to dry, "he told me so."

That was it. Matt gave up even the pretense of washing the dishes. He dropped the scouring pad in the middle of the saucepan and just gaped.

"Yeah, so that's why I blocked you out earlier," Peter said, reaching into the water for the sponge and gently nudging the dumbfounded Matt to the side. "He wanted to ask my advice on how to approach you. For all he knew, you weren't even into men, though we both agreed the gaydar was blinking red on you."

Matt blushed. **Crap.** He'd sworn at 18 that he'd stay closeted until he'd convinced himself the closet was a five-room suite. Hell, he'd almost made marriage work. But one dishwashing session had thrown that idea right out the proverbial window. He grabbed the countertop and stared hard at his hands.

"I told him to let it come naturally, see where things went. But you just seemed so miserable earlier today that I had to butt in. I can never stay in my own business. I'd say I'm sorry, but I'm not, because you're obviously so excited. But I'll let you know what I _will_ do." He winked, one corner of his mouth turning up. "I'll take off early tonight and leave you two some extra time to work it out. That deserves a pardon from the bug squasher, right?"

Matt couldn't face him, but he nodded.

* * *

It was nearly eleven before the dishes were all dried and put away. Matt's fingers were like prunes. Mohinder was patiently clicking through the site, deleting troll posts and updating headlines. It was a nightly routine that took longer and longer each day, as the site found its way to the seven thousand corners of the Internet and drew conspiracy theorists from all walks of life.

"Mohinder Suresh, Webmaster," Matt said, a laugh in his voice, as he flicked some excess water from his fingers onto Mohinder's face.

"Better than dishmaster, I assure you," he said, getting up and removing his glasses. Matt had grown to love those glasses. They seemed just as small and delicate as the rest of his face, as though they'd grown from his bones. He was sad to see them removed, even though Mohinder's eyes were brighter and fuller without them.

"Each to his own," he shrugged. "How's Red File?"

"Very red," Mohinder said. "Someone has actually brought up the name Linderman."

"Uh-oh."

"Yes. It's not a far reach from Linderman to Petrelli, and then we're all in hot water." Mohinder had little frown lines crossing his brow, and Matt found himself staring at them, thinking about smoothing them out one by one, or all at once, top to bottom, inside to outside, in circles...

He shook himself out of it. "We just have to remember, that's what we _want._"

"We ask the questions; others find the answers, right?" The voice was unusually soft, and Matt felt heat welling up inside him. His system was blinking red, too.

"Hey, I have a question."

"We all do." Mohinder seemed to be relishing the role of the cryptic gatekeeper. "I can't promise you any answers, though."

"Are you really crazy about me?"

Mohinder nearly stumbled. He grabbed the back of the chair and held on tight, his fist shaking and rattling the whole computer desk.

Matt couldn't feel anything but heat in his face. "Peter said you were crazy about me."

"I... I might have to kill him the next time I see him," Mohinder murmured.

"So is it true?" He had to force himself to walk forward, but his hand fell onto Mohinder's naturally, holding it firm and steady against the chair and stopping the rattling. His eyes searched Mohinder's face. "My God, it is true, isn't it? I thought you two had teamed up to bullshit me."

Mohinder shook his head. "We're not that clever."

"Says the genius." Matt rolled his eyes.

"I have a question," Mohinder said suddenly, raising his free hand.

"I can't promise any answers," Matt grinned.

Mohinder glanced at the hand on his, and Matt could feel exhiliration pulse through his mind. He paused on the edge of his question, then plunged.

"Are you going to kiss me?"

Matt surged forward, slipped his arms around his waist. He started to speak, then stopped. He leaned forward slowly, as if afraid of hitting the wrong angle. The computer monitor was tinting both of their faces slightly red.

"Well?" Mohinder asked.

But Matt couldn't breathe, much less speak or move. He kept staring at the pink tint on the fleshy edges of Mohinder's lips. They were almost transparent.

Then those lips pursed slightly and vibrated outwards. The tongue flickered and the mouth opened and closed again. Sound followed sight closely behind. Mohinder had said, "Please?"

_Please?_

There was no force in the universe that had ever moved so fast or so powerfully as Matt did to claim his lips at that moment. His vision went scarlet. Hands found his face, trailed fingers along his cheeks, fell to his shoulders. He breathed in for the first time a scent he would never forget.

"Sorry, I don't have any answers for you," he said softly when the first kiss had ended.

"I don't need answers," Mohinder breathed, leaning in to kiss him again.

  
**TheRedFile.com BLOG**

_Some of you are closer to the answers than you have ever been before. We pause now to give you two warnings. One, the truths that you will soon discover are ones that you are not expecting, but they are no less truths for that. The second and more important warning is this: Despite what you may think or what others might tell you, the discoveries you make and the destinations you reach are no more important than whom you choose to share your journey with. In the end, all of our truest answers lie in one another._

**Posted at 12:03 A.M. by The M4 Group**  


:end:  



	20. the road home/kaerimichi

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s like Mohinder said. They’re family. That means he’ll never lose them.

When Matt is discharged from the hospital, it’s not a home he comes to. In fact, he has to turn right around and fly “home” to California to finalize the divorce papers and recover his stuff. A lot of it gets put in storage, because there just isn’t room in a three-person apartment for stuff that filled a two-person house. Luckily, Matt’s not a materialistic guy, and Janice is all too happy to hold onto all the crystal and china and ugly wedding presents. Rewards for bagging a sap. It’s funny that they call the divorce a settlement, because it’s obvious she thought she was settling to begin with.

When he returns to the East Coast, all drizzly snowy rain and muddy rivulets of slush on his shoes, he doesn’t feel like he’s coming home. He feels much more like an exile, like Moses in the desert. A very cold, very wet desert. A desert with rude cabbies and barking dogs and ice that you trip on and bruise your butt. A desert with all of a sudden a little girl at the front door of a dilapidated apartment building yelling up four floors that Mohinder he’s _home_, and all of a sudden there are flowers blooming in the desert.

If Molly says he’s home then perhaps he is. Or on the road there. He’s willing to make a go of it.

The first time he thinks of it as home on his own, without realizing what he’s done, is when they are trying to make plans for New Year’s Eve. Molly is excited to watch the ball drop, and she wants to go out into Times Square and press into that crowd like a little red-headed sardine, but Matt can only think of how nice it’d be to leave all that behind and spend New Year’s at home, and then it strikes him backwards like a sucker punch that he’s thinking about a home involving not a wife and a small dinner party of the partners she’s kissing the ass of this week but rather a faded secondhand couch and a small, grainy color TV that still uses rabbit ears, with a child asleep in his lap, her red hair a curtain over his legs, tiny angelic face tilted heavenward as though trying in vain to wake up so she doesn’t miss the moment. (And with them is a cocoa-skinned scientist whose arms are spread across the back ridge of the couch so that the very tips of his fingers are pressed just inside Matt’s shoulder. His smile is languid and full of a little too much champagne when he says Happy New Year.)

Matt knows it’s just a place to hang his hat, but it feels a little more like home then. Just a half a step closer along that road.

The first time he calls it home out loud is by accident, and he actually corrects himself. In his defense, he has good cause. He’s the rookie in the department and is thus invited out for drinks after work, and he says sorry, but I have to go home, we couldn’t get a babysitter. And about a dozen pairs of eyes go moon-wide and someone says Parkman I thought you said you were _divorced_, and he lies and says oh not _home_ home, it’s the place I’m staying. My friend is putting me up and it’s his little girl and babysitting is the downside to free room and board. Folks are a little disappointed in that and they disperse, but what’s really surprising to Matt is that he’s disappointed too. He wants to say Molly is his. He doesn’t like handing her off to the guy who, you know, saved her life and gives her a home and is probably more or less legally her guardian. No, that should all go to seed because Matt wants to be a daddy, damn it. He laughs bitterly and thinks he’s lost his way. Will he ever find a place he belongs ever again?

The first time Mohinder calls it his home is slightly more momentous, because they’re surrounded by Christmas trees and Christmas decorations and Christmas everything and Matt’s not a Christian. And he admits this with a sheepish gaze and Mohinder smiles sympathetically in a way that makes Matt’s heart leap in his chest, or maybe that’s just the remains of the antibiotics killing another would-be infection from his scars. That would, after all, explain why his skin feels funny and hot as well.

Mohinder says he can understand that feeling (the religion thing, not the hot skin, Matt’s pretty sure), and he encourages Matt to get whatever he needs to make the holiday season special for him. He says he wants Matt to feel at home, that this is his home too. Matt feels his eyes go all red and itchy, and he protests the need for any holiday decorations. For one thing, Chanukah has been over for days, and for another, what Mohinder has just said has brought Matt closer to feeling at home than any decorations ever could.

The first time Matt calls them his family is Christmas Eve. They have been saying every day that they’re going to get a Christmas tree or lights or something, not because they want it of course but because of Molly, because it’s her first holiday without her parents. But then it’s upon them and they’re desperately sorry and decide they will apologize to her because they are such lousy caretakers that they can’t even manage a Christmas tree (Mohinder slyly suggests Matt don a Santa suit, at which point they laugh and drop that idea like a hot potato). But Molly scoffs at them. Her parents were hippies, she says. They preached no gospel to her but that of John Lennon (imagine no religion...) Matt considers this a supreme cheat and says that every child deserves a holiday season, so he’s going to treat the family to a Jewish Christmas: Chinese food on Christmas Eve, and the movies on Christmas Day. He sweeps them out the door and they order hot and sour soup and never think twice about the fact that he’s just called them his family.

Mohinder is much more momentous about saying words like these, Matt has learned, and he proves it again because when he calls Matt part of his family for the first time, it’s late at night on Christmas Day and he actually starts the conversation with it. He thanks Matt for making it such a nice day for the family, that he hopes it’s OK that he thinks of them that way, and Matt nods and agrees with gusto. And Mohinder leans forward against the table and says it’s kind of ironic given the irreligious nature of the three of them, but he thinks it’s time to make a leap of faith. His hands are on Matt’s on the tabletop and Matt is nervous and stares at them, then up at Mohinder’s eyes. Mohinder’s leap of faith is to tell Matt that Molly’s not the only reason he considers him family, and that if Matt were ever, ever to consider Mohinder something beyond a roommate and friend and co-parent, well, Mohinder would be OK with it.

The words sort of deaden Matt’s hearing when they’re out. He stares at him without a thought in his head, much less words to reply. It’s a blank, blinking moment. Mohinder blinks in reply, says look, think about it, this is the thing, I think of you as family, so you don’t need to worry about rejecting me, nothing’s going to change. This seems silly to Matt because everything’s already changed and he is sitting across the planet from the man across the table, and he thinks he might jump out of his skin, and home has never seemed so out of reach.

The first time Matt gets homesick it’s New Year’s Eve and he’s on that faded couch with beer and popcorn and Molly and Mohinder, laughing abut something or other. Mohinder’s eyes are deep and full and inviting, and Matt keeps thinking about his offer, about the fullness and humor Mohinder has brought into a life that had been an empty shell. If it were not for the sticky question of gender, he wonders, would there be anyone on this earth he’d more want to spend his New Year’s Eve, or his daughter, or his life with? And that’s ducking the question to some extent, because the gender thing has never been the problem. It just has never been an issue. Honestly, the religion thing is more likely to be a problem to him than the gender thing, and they dealt pretty well with it earlier this month. And when Mohinder sees Matt regarding him with heated eyes, Matt hears a swell of hope creep into his mind. And that is both exciting and terrifying.

But this isn’t when Matt gets homesick. Not at 10 o’clock when the chief on duty calls and says he needs someone for a domestic call in Chinatown. But it’s New Year’s Eve? That’s why he’s short on bodies, the cop barks into the phone. Use your head, Parkman, unless you’d like another year to go by before you get your badge. Matt gets up and gets his coat, and Molly looks like she’s about to die of agony. Where are you going, she wants to know. He has to go to work. But you’re gonna miss the ball drop!

He kisses the crown of her head and promises to be back in time to wish them both a happy new year. She makes him pinky swear. He asks her how come the littlest finger is the one you use for the biggest promises. She has no answer and wrinkles her nose in concentration, the same way Mohinder does. He tells her he expects a an answer by midnight and leaves her there to stew.

But it’s not then, or on his way, that he gets homesick. He still has a lot of confidence in his ability to get home in time. The call is a simple noise complaint, college students having a New Year’s party that most definitely smells of pot and sounds like an atomic bomb. Matt raps on the door, is greeted with an expletive, and says those are his thoughts exactly. That there is no cop in the world who wants to be out busting a coupla kids having a good time. So they’re pretty damned lucky they got him, because another cop would have already had three unpleasant calls and wouldn’t have any patience left for this shit. So maybe they want to think about being just a little smarter about getting stupid, so they don’t end up with a cop who has a bug up his butt and sends them to the clink for possession? With testing and searches and all of that nastiness that is, in Matt’s view, completely unnecessary?

It’s a good routine, and it works. The kids agree, and the atomic bomb lessens in strength to be just a locomotive. So Matt’s not homesick.

No, he starts to feel it when it’s 11 p.m. and he’s lumbering down the stairs and there’s a gunshot and a woman’s scream and he realizes it’s going to be a longer night than he thought.

He inches across the hallway and listens at the door and wonders, in that one split second, what Molly and Mohinder are doing. Are they watching Dick Clark or whoever does it these days? Has Molly fallen asleep? Is Mohinder massaging her hair with one smooth hand, and is he thinking about Matt and missing Matt and hoping he’ll be home? Or is he just glad for some peace and quiet without the dumb grunt who can’t cook and can’t read and can’t see what a miracle he has right before his very eyes?

That’s when Matt gets homesick.

Then he hears a child crying and doesn’t have the luxury of another split second of homesickness.

He shouts Police, Open Up, and thank God thank God the woman does, her son’s found her gun and shot himself in the leg by accident, please, please help. Matt hates himself for being thankful when the mother’s in panic, but it could have been in the head, could have been _her_ head, could have been deliberate. He radios for an ambulance and kneels beside the boy. His name is Simon. Matt says Simon was his favorite Chipmunk. This makes even teary-eyed, crumpled-on-the-floor, bleeding Simon grin.

It’s 11:30 p.m. Matt looks at the boy and sees his daughter and resolves to put the gun case on an even higher shelf. He feels terrible when the stretcher arrives and Simon asks if he’s coming to the hospital with them and he almost says no. He means to say no. But he can’t. He just can’t.

He holds Simon’s hand in the ambulance. The road home has never seemed so long in his life.

At the hospital he fills out forms blindly; he’s so desperate he can’t see, so he prays things are where they were the last time he filed an accident report. Maybe he can look it over tomorrow. Or the next day. Or oh God if this had been his child how on earth would he handle it?

It’s 11:50 p.m. Simon’s father comes running into the emergency room and goes to his wife, crying. She’s got him in a desperate embrace and Matt thinks they look like two cracked pillars, neither able to stand on its own but somehow stable when leaning on each other. Not just stable. Solid.

It’s 11:53 p.m. and Simon’s mother says thank you, we’ll be OK, my husband’s here so I’ll be OK, don’t you have a family to be with right now, thank you for saving my baby please go be with your family. Hug them, kiss them, she says. Protect them. And Matt hears himself say something with I’m sorry and I have to, and he doesn’t know how he even makes it to the car so quickly but he knows this is the one and only time he will _ever_ abuse his siren, and if he loses his job because of it, so be it. Anything to open up that road.

It’s 11:58 p.m. and he is sprinting up the steps in a way he didn’t think he could anymore. In a way that will surely hit him in 20 seconds when he can’t breathe. His feet pound to the rhythm of two names. Molly. Mohinder. Molly. Mohinder. Love. Home.

He comes to the door and hears three, two, one, Happy New Year! His keys go slack in his hand. He missed it.

He listens to them congratulate each other. Wet smack of a child’s kiss. Soft groan of arms carrying her weight. Happy New Year, Mohinder. Happy New Year, Molly. He is ready to sink down into the earth and never rise again.

And then, shouted: Happy New Year, Matt, wherever you are! We love you!

No pain, no betrayal or heartache, just understanding and love in that child’s voice. Because it’s like Mohinder said. They’re family. That means he’ll never lose them.

The key rattles in the lock and he throws the door open, Happy-New-Yearing at the top of his lungs. Molly’s in his arms in a heartbeat saying you made it, you made it, and despite the fact that no, he didn’t, he’s all bluster and told-you-I’d-be-here. He nuzzles her cheek and she eeks at his cold nose and then decides she will pour him some sparkling cider and jumps down from his arms.

And there is only air between him and Mohinder now. And Mohinder is smiling that gentle observant way he smiles when he’s standing on the sidelines watching the two of them play, when he is the fascinated scientist with his favorite discovery. But Matt has a discovery of his own, and he is not smiling. He is not standing on the sidelines. He is walking.

He is walking over to Mohinder and whispering Happy New Year, Mohinder and sliding a hand into his hair and leaning in and slipping the other hand around his waist and taking a leap of faith.

Molly watches them kiss and watches them stare at each other and smile and watches the new chapter of their lives begin, and then she interrupts because she’s done pouring the bubbly, and they all settle down onto the couch to watch some guy propose to his girlfriend in the middle of Times Square. She says yes, of course, because who’s not going to say yes with cameras rolling?

They fall asleep on that couch, all three of them, Molly’s head on Matt’s lap and Mohinder’s fingers lightly on the back of his neck. And it’s been a hell of a long road, but Matt is home.

:end:


	21. pillage or plunder/goudatsu

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oh boy, did I go waaaay off on a tangent with this one. Pure silliness the likes of which we have not seen since Kiss #8. I just saw "plunder" and thought....

"Ninjas or pirates?"

Matt and Mohinder blinked in unison.

"What?" said Matt.  
"Beg pardon?" said Mohinder at the same time.

"Ninjas or pirates?" Molly repeated.

"Where did this come from?" Mohinder rose from the table and poured another cup of tea from the kettle.

"We're doing a unit on debating in social studies," Molly explained impatiently. "So we had to choose something to debate. We voted on it and that's what won."

Matt burst out laughing. "Your social studies class is going to debate _ninjas versus pirates_? Man, I wish I'd gone to school in New York."

"Yeah, it's pretty cool, but I don't know which side I want to be on." Molly's brow was furrowed as though she were confronting a major moral dilemma. "So I figured I'd ask you. Ninjas or pirates?"

"Pirates," said Matt.  
"Ninjas," said Mohinder at the same time.

They gaped at each other.

"What are you, crazy?" Matt burst out. "Ninjas aren't even in the same league as pirates!"

"Pirates have no class," Mohinder said calmly, sipping his tea in an infuriatingly self-righteous fashion. "Ninjas are refined and stealthy. I much prefer a warrior of the shadows to some smelly, loud old man with an eyepatch and a peg leg who doesn't shave."

"It's not about class, it's about power," Matt said, though he put a hand to his stubble uncomfortably. "Ninjas can only steal stuff and kill people. They run into a pirate, they're shot dead in two second flat."

"Well, there's the difference, isn't it?" Mohinder retorted. "You think it's how much damage you do that's important. I prefer doing as little damage as possible and coming away the richer for it."

"Ninjas weren't rich!" Matt was flailing so wildly that Molly had to duck to avoid a spoon in her eye. "Pirates had so much treasure they had to _bury_ some of it!"

Mohinder leaned forward, grinning. "Ah, but the ninja always got the one thing he wanted most. And most of the time, its owners never knew it was gone. That's how good they were."

"Mm-hm, so why were they only in one country, then?" Matt challenged him. "There were pirates in Europe, in Africa, in Asia-- there are still pirates! You never hear them called software _ninjas_, do you?" He snapped his fingers. "You know what? You work for a bunch of pirates! They kidnap people, steal whatever they want, act like they own the world..."

"What about you?" Mohinder scoffed. "Your ability is all about stealing into people's minds! You are practically a ninja yourself!"

"You guys are no help," Molly said, rolling her eyes and leaving the two of them to glare at each other over the remainder of dessert.

"You're insane," said Mohinder simply. And that was the end of that.

Except it wasn't.

It became the game of the day to try to influence Molly's choice. One evening, when Mohinder went for the last of the coveted vegetable samosas, Matt grabbed it, took a bite, and said through a full mouth, "Pirates."

Another time, the phone rang, and Matt went running for it, leaping over piles of dirty laundry and nearly impaling himself on the kitchen table in his rush to make it in time. When he finally reached the counter, Mohinder suddenly popped up from the other side and put his hand decisively on the ringing phone. "Ninjas," he said with a sickly-sweet smile before answering it.

All of this fell on deaf ears, of course, as Molly had already made her choice and was now doing her best not to broach the subject again.

Mohinder was thoroughly disgusted at the very thought of pirates. What sort of uncivilized boor thought it was heroic to go around looting, pillaging, drinking a lot of rum, and sailing around like a bunch of slackers? Civilized people didn't just come in waving pistols and swords and take whatever they wanted. If that were the way things worked, Mohinder would have long since just grabbed Matt by the shoulders and...

Well, he would have done something that would surely have had repercussions.

Matt, on the other hand, found the concept of the ninja supremely distasteful. If you're going to go after something, he figured, you ought to at the very least be forthright about it. Everything that went wrong in life seemed to be due to someone lying or deceiving or sneaking around or otherwise not admitting what they wanted. Better to get it all out in the open. Then, at least, you can have your no-holds-barred battle, declare a winner, and move on with your life. That's how he'd prefer things to work. Never mind that the one thing he most wanted right now was the one thing he couldn't reach for. But he blamed that on lousy social skills. He'd never been able to approach girls, much less the beautiful, brilliant, out-of-his-league geneticist he was so fortunate (or unfortunate) to live under the same roof as. You'd have to have a reputation like Blackbeard's to believe you'd be able to score that kind of booty. Pun very much intended.

Yes, they were the veritable Pride and Prejudice of the modern world, these two. A pirate and a ninja, madly in love, but too pigheaded to admit it. But never fear--a pair of events cropped up to break the stalemate.

The first was that Matt came home from a late shift to find Mohinder asleep on the couch, where he often went to study late at night when his room became too claustrophobic. He'd been snacking on a tinful of jelly beans, and there was a crust of crystal sugar at the corner of his mouth. Matt suddenly developed a sweet tooth the size of Cleveland, and a handful of the candy didn't seem to appease it. So he bent over the sleeping form and gently pursed his lips against that delicious-looking spot, tongue flickering out to lick up the sugar. He lingered on the corner of Mohinder's lips perhaps a little longer than he should have, feeling the gentle evenness of his breathing. Jelly beans or no, his skin was sweet almost beyond comprehension. But Mohinder never stirred.

Matt pulled back and regarded the face. His brow was rumpled, as though he were still trying to solve a complex problem in his sleep. He frowned a little. His lips were slightly chapped. Matt couldn't help himself. He bent down and drank more fully from those oblivious lips. This time it was even harder to let go and straighten up. But Mohinder slept through it all.

As Matt left the room, he looked back at the sleeping man, and a wave of tenderness shot through him. He thought, _Well. There may be something to this ninja business after all._

(He was, however, confronted at the breakfast table the next morning. "You stole something from me last night," Mohinder said with a scowl.

Matt gaped.

Then Mohinder continued. "You think I didn't notice half of my jelly beans were gone?")

The second thing that happened was, Molly's social studies class decided to hold a mock debate and invite the parents. It was held on a Saturday afternoon in the small auditorium; Molly was arguing for the pirate side. (Matt had crowed triumphantly at that, and Mohinder had looked appropriately petulant.) The art teacher and a few other ostensibly neutral faculty members were the judges, and they had set it up like a congressional hearing, where each side had its row of desks with stuffy-looking name cards. Mohinder noted with a grin and a pleased nudge at Matt's side that Molly's name card said "Ms. Suresh-Parkman-Walker."

The debate style of the fourth grade was hardly Supreme Court quality. Several of the boys showed off their mock ninja moves, and a few of the girls extolled the virtues of Johnny Depp. But Molly, as usual, stole the show. She took the stage, adjusted her note cards, and cleared her throat.

"I am arguing in favor of pirates today," she declared, "but I want to say one thing first. For a week now, my dads have been arguing over this." Mohinder and Matt blushed, and those parents that knew them glanced over. "So I've kind of heard the whole debate already. And this is what I want to say. I think there's room in the world for both."

At this, her teammates wailed at her. She wailed at them to be quiet. "I know, I know, shhh!"

"But here's what I think," she went on. "I think that you can be a ninja and be all sneaky and creepy, or you can be a pirate and sing a lot and sail and have pet parrots. And maybe being a ninja works for some people, but I kind of think pirates seem a lot happier. They're friends with other pirates. And you never see a ninja smile. Maybe that makes them tougher, but I bet they're really unhappy under that mask, you know?" The adults laughed. Matt was practically doubled over, he was giggling so hard.

"So that's why I say pirates are cooler. Because even when my dads were arguing about it, they seemed really happy while they were doing it. And that made me think they were more like pirates than ninjas. And I think my dads are just about the coolest people I know," she grinned, "so if they're pirates, that makes pirates cool. OK, I'm done now." With that unceremonious finish, she stomped back to her seat, and the parents applauded and laughed.

Matt's face was pink with pride, and his smile was a mile wide. Mohinder felt a great desire to just grab his hand. The sort of urge a ninja would resist. But then again, his daughter had just made a very compelling argument.

He found Matt's hand, intending to squeeze it briefly and let go. But Matt neither gasped nor winced. He just closed his fingers around Mohinder's and maintained the warm grip. Mohinder's cheeks felt hot. _Perhaps there is something to this pirate business after all,_ he thought.

At this, Matt turned to look at him briefly, then just smiled and gazed back at the stage.

Pirates won, of course, and the winning team got a school-sponsored ice cream party (next Friday at 3:30, so the parents could pick up hyperactive children and clean up after them when they hit the ceiling at Mach 3). So Molly was jubilant. She stayed up way past her bedtime that night and eventually fell asleep, along with Matt, on the couch watching "Saturday Night Live" -- she liked what she understood of the jokes, which weren't many these days.

Mohinder came into the room, turned off the TV, picked up Molly, and deposited her in her bed. As she settled into the pillows, she murmured, "'course I like ninjas too" and fell silent again, smiling. Mohinder melted a little.

Aglow with pride, he wandered back to the living room and sat down beside snoring, drooling Matt on the couch. He really was the epitome of a boorish, unkempt pirate, Mohinder thought with a chuckle. There was absolutely no good reason to adore him as much as he did.

Well, if Matt was so into pirates, and if Molly decided she liked them too, he was damned well going to give it a try. He leaned in toward the drool-leaking mouth, wiped it with one corner of his sleeve, and whispered, "Pirate." And he kissed those soft, sleeping lips.

All at once strong arms were locked around him and he was falling down onto the couch over Matt, who was wide awake and kissing him back. "Ninja," murmured Matt into his mouth, growling and smiling against him. Mohinder whimpered helplessly and threaded his hands through Matt's hair, clinging to him. They stayed lost in the kiss for another minute, then drew back to stare at each other. Matt was grinning ear to ear. "You didn't think I was going to stop at hand-holding, did you?"

"Matt, you ass!" Mohinder burst out. "You were faking it?"

"The sleeping part, yes. The kiss was very real." Matt ran a hand across Mohinder's cheek. "God, I wish you had just told me." There was a spark in his eyes Mohinder had never seen before but very much liked.

"We ninja prefer our secrets," he replied, half-smiling.

"Less talk, more action," Matt said, pulling him down again. Mohinder tried to talk, couldn't, as his mouth was so very happily occupied. So he settled for thinking it. _If you're a pirate, what does that make me?_

"My treasure," Matt whispered into his mouth. And that answered that.

:end:  



	22. cradle/yurikago

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Molly has a secret. Matt gets drunk. Mohinder gets used to being called Mom. And that's just the beginning.

Janice's baby was born in June. A little boy, looking just like his mother. Janice's mother called; she'd always been partial to Matt and thought he ought to at least know. Matt hung up the phone, sighed, and thank God Molly was in the room or he might have gone straight for the booze. Instead, he put her on his lap and told her what he'd heard.

Her reaction was a little weird. She gave a bit of a funny half-smile and suggested Matt send a card of congratulations. A good idea. But when Matt suggested she help pick one out, she shut down just a bit. "I don't want to. I don't know her." Matt sighed. He'd known this day was coming, but he realized then that he'd counted on his own family--or imitation family, perhaps--to keep his head above water when it finally arrived. And Molly's lack of reaction was letting him down.

What's worse, she was sort of sullen the whole rest of the day. She didn't ask for any help on her homework, didn't want to watch any of their usual TV shows, didn't even want a story. "I just kind of want to go to sleep," she said. And it was the most words she'd strung together since Matt gave her the news. He felt childishly indignant, as though she had no right to be upset when it was his day to do so. How dare she distract him from his pity party with her own?

So when Mohinder got home, he found Matt half-sloshed in the kitchen.

His initial response was anger. "How can you do that with a child in the house?" he said. "What if there is some emergency and you can't respond because you've been drinking too heavily to hear her?"

"Oh, c'moff it," Matt grumbled. "S'one an only night I get drunk 'n' here you are so no harm no foul."

"Thankfully," Mohinder snapped. "All right, but if this ever happens again there will be no more alcohol in this house. And if there is ever, and I mean _ever_, a strike three? You're so much worse than out."

"Fair 'nuff," Matt said, sighing heavily.

That seemed to be good enough to appease Mohinder, at least for now. "What's the occasion?" he asked, sitting down in his usual seat and kicking off his shoes.

"Boy," Matt said.

"What?"

"'Sa boy. Jan's mom called."

"Oh." Mohinder pondered the significance of this, and when it sunk in he repeated himself, slower this time. "...Oh." He searched Matt's face. "How do you feel?"

"Drunk." Matt grinned stupidly. "Thank God."

"Right. Sorry I asked."

The silence was heavy--claustrophobic, almost. Mohinder felt long and gangly, too much leg and arm and too little substance. He wanted to curl up, to take up less space.

"'m never gonna have one," Matt mumbled, his chin resting on his folded arms. He was watching the remainder of the brown liquid in his glass change shape as he tilted the glass back and forth--triangle, then rectangle, then triangle again.

"One what?" Mohinder asked carefully.

"Family." Matt caught Mohinder's eye through the glass, and even with the distortion Mohinder caught his breath at the sadness there. "'Sall I ever wanted was a family a'my own. And I'm never gonna have one."

"What are you talking about?" Mohinder frowned at him. Matt was extremely illogical when he was intoxicated. "In case you'd forgotten, there's a nine-year-old girl sleeping in that room over there who considers you her father."

Matt tilted his head to the side. "She does not."

Annoyed, Mohinder grabbed the glass and swallowed the last bit of whiskey himself. It burned going down. "It might make life easier for you if she didn't. That way you could keep feeling sorry for yourself and never take responsibility, but she does. And that makes you a father whether you like it or not. Now start acting like one." He got up, grabbed the half-empty bottle and the glass, stomped over to the sink.

Matt followed him, breathed on the back of his neck. Mohinder shivered in disgust. "Does that make you Mommy?" he drawled.

"Oh, for God's sake, sleep it off!" Mohinder grabbed his arms, spun him around, and marched him into the bedroom.

"Sure, Mom, whatever you say. I'm a lucky husband," said Matt sleepily as he hit the bed. "Father knows best." But then he was asleep. Mohinder stared at him a moment, then rolled his eyes and left the room, closing the door behind him.

Matt dreamed that night of an unfamiliar scene. He was in the sunny attic of a house he didn't recognize, surrounded by boxes and old clothes on hangars. It smelled of mothballs and dust. In a clearing near the window sat a cradle, ideal for a newborn, lined with flowery yellow fabric and sitting on white wooden rockers. He was filled with a sense of anticipation in the dream, and he thought he heard a voice near him whispering _Soon. Very soon._

He woke up more confused than hung over.

* * *

That was the day it started. And it was barely noticeable at first--just the lack of a joke where normally she would chime in, or a weekend where all she wanted to do was stay at home and read. But it grew quickly into something greater than that. Molly was stewing over something, and it was sapping all her energy. They hadn't seen her this upset since the nightmare days. Something was eating her.

When Molly didn't eat her dinner one night, Matt felt her forehead, but she wasn't sick, just sullen. "I'm just tired, leave me alone," she fussed, going to her room and slamming the door.

Matt looked at Mohinder for guidance, but he just shrugged. "You're the mind-reader, not me," he said simply.

Matt walked down the hall and rapped at her door. "Molly?" Paint chipped against his knuckles. "Honey, is there something you want to talk about?"

"No, I'm fine, I'm just tired!" she snapped.

"OK, honey, OK." He sighed, leaning heavily on the doorframe. "You promise you'll come talk to us if you feel like it?"

Silence.

"Molly? You know you can tell us anything, right?"

_Leave me alone I hate you I hate her go away go away go away._

Matt stumbled back as if stung. "What?" Mohinder said, taking a few steps forward.

"She's really upset," Matt said. "She... she said she hated me."

Putting a hand on his shoulder, Mohinder said, "Little girls will think that way about their fathers every so often. Try not to take it hard. Maybe she really is just tired."

Matt raised weary eyes to meet his. "Can we go have a drink?"

Mohinder frowned.

"Hell, I'll have water. I just need to sit down."

* * *

They both had water. Tea, actually. Mohinder always had some weird brew. This one was called Assam and Matt had never heard of it, but it was a little spicy and strange-tasting. Matt heaved a heavy sigh as he stirred in a bit of sugar. "I'm no good at this," he moaned. "I should have been there for her more often."

"Me too, for that matter," Mohinder concurred. "But we are here now. That's something."

"How can you stay so positive?" Matt looked for all the world like a puppy who'd been kicked to the curb, and the truth was, Mohinder was feeling kind of protective of him. It was easy for him to slip into nurturing mode. He didn't have to think about his own anxieties when he was comforting someone else.

But he didn't tell Matt that. "Because it's important to take care of oneself. I owe it to Molly to remain mature about these things. She depends on that."

"Which is probably why she didn't say anything about hating _you._" Matt burned his tongue on the tea and drew back, hissing. "She did say something about hating _her._ Whoever _she_ is."

"A classmate, perhaps?" Mohinder wondered. Then, giving a little half-smile over the tea, "Or do you have some secret girlfriend you've been bringing over while I'm out?"

"What? I'm surprised at you, Mom!" Matt joked. "You know I'd never cheat on you." This had become a joke in the days since Matt's one-time bender. Mohinder got protective, and he was Mom. Even Molly was in on it, at least for a little while, before whatever was bothering her ruined her sense of humor.

"Oh, so I'm not just Mom now? We're actually married at this point?"

"We've lived together long enough." He shrugged. "Probably in some states we would be, legally." Somehow the tea and the company were putting things back into perspective, and he was grateful.

Mohinder nodded. "We _have_ put up with an awful lot together."

"A ridiculous amount."

"More than many people who are married."

"Exactly. Unless, of course, you'd rather we get divorced. I suppose you would get the apartment, though, so I'll have to fight it tooth and nail. See you in court."

Mohinder laughed, a full, round laugh that made Matt smile in return. He realized then he was joking about divorce. The subject didn't sting nearly the way it used to. And he'd happily sent along that card of congratulations. (Of course, that had a lot to do with schadenfreude that McHenry had to face consequences to his actions that went far beyond a locker-room punch.) Maybe he was finally ready to move on.

He just wasn't entirely sure where he was moving to.

He had the same dream about the yellow cradle that night, and he woke up in tears, unsure why. There had been a flash of something else at the end of the dream that had changed everything, made the feeling go from idyllic excitement to utter tragedy. Blood, a scream, something horrific. He almost called across the country to make sure Janice and the baby were OK, but he forced himself to wait till morning.

She was fine, the baby was fine, McHenry was miserable; all was as it should be. Maybe his brain had just been working through the whole thing. But he had an unsettled feeling in the pit of his stomach for the whole day, and that night, the dream returned again.

* * *

He brought Molly's laundry into the room on Sunday and realized what an opportunity he had. She was in the other room doodling in her notebook where she was supposed to be taking notes for a book report, and Matt didn't have the heart to scold her. His little girl feeling down was quite possibly the worst thing in the whole world. He almost preferred it when there was a bad guy to hunt down. At least then he knew what he was up against. With this, he just felt exhausted.

Setting down the laundry basket on her bed and peeking out of the doorway to make sure she wasn't coming, Matt started rifling through the papers on her desk, the books on her nightstand. But he couldn't find a clue. She was such a ridiculously neat kid that every sweater in her closet was hung up and every doll was perched on the windowsill, reminding Matt of a nursery rhyme he'd heard somewhere about pretty maids all in a row. Their beaded and painted eyes seemed to follow him reproachfully as he snooped into his daughter's private stuff.

The doll at the end had an outstretched hand, and at a loss, not really realizing it, he followed the plastic pointer toward the opposite wall. Her calendar had pictures of unicorns under rainbows, and each day that had passed was methodically X-ed out. Following an instinct, he flipped up the page to view the next month.

There was a big, black circle around July 1. No, there were many black circles, as though she'd been mindlessly drawing rings around it. And as he turned back to June, he saw for the first time multiple trails of pencil dots tracking through each day of the month, as though she'd been counting them. Anxiously, he pulled out the pushpin and flipped to previous months. The X marks and the pencil dots went back to New Year's.

He told Mohinder what he'd found in hushed tones. "Whatever it is she's afraid of," Matt said seriously, "she's acting like it's the end of the world, and I'm afraid if she doesn't talk to us soon, it will be."

Mohinder nodded. "I think you're right. We've let this go on far too long. She lives under our roof, she needs to level with us. She is still a child, and whatever she's dealing with can't be easy to handle alone."

"Our roof, huh..." Matt lingered on the concept. He supposed that he had come to consider this his apartment, at that. He'd lived here long enough that it certainly was no longer just a crash pad.

"Because we're married. Joint ownership and all." Mohinder was slyly smiling, and his eyelashes were fluttering up and down.

"So what do you suppose we should do?"

"I'll see if I can pry it out of her. But if that doesn't work, we need to sit her down. Perhaps tomorrow night. After dinner. And make her tell us."

Mohinder made her favorite dish that night, something he called Indian Mac 'N' Cheese, noodles and sweet cheese and spices in a creamy, yogurty concoction. It looked for a while like she was going to perk up some. She asked questions about his family and his life in India. But then things took a considerable turn for the worse.

"I sometimes wonder if you aren't my sister Shanti come back to life," he said, meaning only to flatter her. "I imagine that she must have been a lot like you. Strong and brave and honest."

Molly pouted and pushed her bowl away. "I didn't ask about your stupid sister," she said in a low, heated voice.

Matt had to break in. "Molly, that's not nice."

She stood up, slammed her palms against the table. "I said, I don't care about your stupid sister! Who wants to hear about her, anyway? Who cares who she was? She's _dead!_" And Molly fled, shrieking, to her room.

"That is unacceptable!" Matt thundered after her, but Mohinder put a hand on his arm, stopping him. "Man, I'm sorry. That's so rough." He turned back to face him. Mohinder looked like he'd been punched in the gut. His face was pale and there was wetness near his eyes.

That night he insisted Mohinder have a beer. He stuck to tea. Because it was only fair.

"It's a remarkably bad idea," Mohinder informed him. "My tolerance for alcohol is abysmal."

Matt sucked in the bitter Earl Gray taste. "Now you've given me something to look forward to."

It took only the first bottle to get Mohinder loose, but Matt was still stuck in reality. "Sometimes I think I've doomed her," he said despondently. "She's never going to have real parents again."

"God, don't say that," Mohinder pleaded. "It's t-- too depressing, even for me."

"Think about it!" Matt insisted, raising his mug. "We're not her father. We're just glorified babysitters. Real parents have a bond. They don't yell at each other all the time or go halfway around the world teaching--"

Mohinder winced as though stung. "Or go s-- searching for killers," he retorted, though his words were a little slurred. He took another long drink.

"We should take better care of her. And ourselves."

"And each other."

Matt shot him a look. "How can we take better care of each other? We joke about it, Mohinder, but we're not married. We're just roommates. We're not even friends."

"Well, maybe we have to be," Mohinder suggested. "Because we are doing this together. Isn't she worth tolerating me?" It sounded a little like a whine.

Matt choked on his drink, then laughed. "_You're_ worth tolerating you. For whatever that's worth."

"I'm touched," Mohinder grinned, swigging the beer. "I might just kiss you for that."

"Bring it," blustered Matt. "I can take it."

It had to be the alcohol, but Mohinder leaned over the table and did just that, wet, alcohol-tinged lips on Matt's firm and solid.

Maybe it started as a joke--Lord knew Mohinder was drunk enough to find such a prank funny. But there was a jolt of electricity that passed between them, a lurching of heat in Matt's core, and something changed in the dynamic. And suddenly Mohinder was on his lap with his hands in his hair, and they were kissing like two people who weren't drunk and actually wanted to be kissing, like two people who needed each other. It felt like it wasn't a joke anymore, like perhaps it never really was.

"Be careful what you wish for," Mohinder drawled sleepily when they gasped for air.

"You need to go to bed," Matt decided, trying to ignore the foolish heat that was coiling inside him. He pushed Mohinder up, stopped him from staggering, marched him down the hall. When Mohinder shed a few tears, his mind whispering _our poor little girl_ into Matt's just before he went into his bedroom, Matt found himself pressing his own lips to the damp forehead, the wet cheeks, even the corners of the pouting lower lip. Whatever the implications were of what they'd done would wait for sobriety and the morning.

That night, Matt dreamed something entirely different. He was somewhere small, somewhere he couldn't breathe or move, and he knew that if he dared, something horrible would happen to him. So he was safe, but trapped, and it was either that or free but dead. And in the back of his mind he couldn't stop thinking about a yellow cradle rocking in the attic.

_It'll never happen!_

He woke up sweating and shouting, and it took him a few moments to realize that he hadn't been himself in that dream. He'd been Molly.

* * *

The intervention happened the next night, as planned. Molly looked down at the floor, hands folded in her lap, and Matt put his big hand over them both. "Molly, I know you don't really want to talk about this, but it's time you told us what was bothering you."

"You're right, I don't," she snapped. Her eyes were red already.

"Is it something with school? Are you having trouble there?" Mohinder, standing just behind Matt, spoke gently. She shook her head, jaw clenched to keep from wailing. "Sweetheart, I know you're in pain, but the truth is, you're not being fair to us."

Her head jerked upward at that. "What do you mean?" she hissed angrily. "It's got nothing to do with you."

"Except for I've been having your dreams," Matt said sternly. She froze, stunned. "And if something's happening on July first, then we need to know about it."

"July... You were in my stuff!" Now she did burst out crying, a full-throated scream of anger. "I hate you! I hate you and I hate your stupid wife and I hate everyone!" She dove into the couch, screaming and sobbing.

Matt and Mohinder looked at each other. "My wife?" Matt finally asked gently.

"I hate her!" Molly screamed, her voice shaking the bookcases and rattling the glass. "How come she got to have one? It's not fair!" A new round of sobs wracked her body.

_Have one?_ Matt mouthed to Mohinder.

_A baby, perhaps?_

And all of a sudden, Matt had the sinking feeling he knew what July 1 was about.

There was only one way to make sure. He clapped a hand to her shoulder and concentrated, felt that familiar vacuum drawing him in. He willed himself to go there, to see it, to be there for her and with her no matter what horrors lay behind. And the veil began to lift, slowly, then with dizzying speed.

All at once he was in her old house, under the stairs with her, hiding; he was in the room seeing her parents fall, blood-soaked; he heard a familiar laugh and a face neither of them would ever forget.

And then, he was in that attic, peering in wonder along with her at a small, yellow-lined cradle rocking slightly on its wooden legs. _Soon,_ she was thinking. _So very soon..._

Matt withdrew his hand. Here and now returned "Molly, your mother..."

Molly slowly raised her head, nodded her tear-streaked face. "She'd just told us that week. We bought it for her as a present. Dad and I."

"What? What?" Mohinder leaned forward.

"Her mom was pregnant," Matt said in a voice devoid of emotion; it was the only way he could bear to say it out loud. "When they were killed. She was going to give Molly a little brother or sister, and she never got to. That's what July first is. It's when the baby was due."

"Oh." Mohinder's eyes became hollow with horror. "Oh, my."

They both rushed forward to hold her, and she sobbed uncontrollably. "We bought a cradle--" she sniffed and gasped and gulped-- "as a present-- we kept it in the attic-- we were going to give it to her the next week-- surprise her--

** _"Mom! Dad!" _ **

It was almost the first time she'd cried about them since she moved in; there had been a few tears, of course, but nothing truly momentous. With this, though, the dam broke and she was inconsolable.

She cried for a long time that night, for the mother and father that had been stolen from her and the brother or sister she'd never been able to know. And Matt and Mohinder cried with her. Because some grief couldn't help but touch your mind even if you weren't a telepath. And because something changed in that moment of revelation, and the imitation family felt like a real one, and real fathers cried when their real daughter was in pain.

And when the tears finally subsided, her eyes were red-lined stars swimming with sorrow, but she managed to smile. And it wasn't even midnight, but that smile felt like dawn.

* * *

When she'd calmed and hugged them and thanked them for being there and had a drink of water and cried some more and finally dropped off to sleep, they wordlessly went to the kitchen, minds sharing a single thought: _It is time for a fucking drink._

Matt grabbed the teapot. Mohinder grabbed the six-pack. They looked at each other and laughed.

They compromised and went for the slightly less dangerous drug of hot chocolate. It slid down like velvet and comfort, and Matt felt warm. "So, um.... do we need to talk about anything?" he ventured.

"About what?"

Mohinder seemed to be lost in a world of foamy cocoa. Matt nearly slapped him for his cluelessness. "About last night." Then Mohinder finally had the temerity to turn red. Matt went on. "I'm going to assume it was the alcohol talking, because you haven't mentioned it, and I guess you'd rather pretend it never happened, which I can understand..." He was surprised to hear keen disappointment in his own voice. But perhaps it wasn't so much of a surprise, not really, because even now he was looking at those flushed, slightly pouting lips and remembering.

Mohinder didn't answer immediately. But just when Matt had figured he'd gone mute, he gave a sunny smile and said, "It's a non-issue for me. Because we're married, you know."

Matt sighed inwardly. Mohinder wanted to write it off as a joke, after all. He shouldn't be surprised. Or disappointed, for that matter.

But then two of his fingers were seized by a warm hand under the table.

Matt looked down for a moment, then curled the rest of his fingers into Mohinder's and smiled at him. Mohinder smiled back.

"You guys are grinning at each other."

Molly's voice was sleepy. "Can I have another glass of water? My eyes are itchy from crying."

Mohinder jumped up to get it. Molly padded over in her stocking feet, crawled onto Matt's lap, and tucked her head under his chin. When Mohinder returned, he put one hand on Matt's shoulder and reached around with the other to give her the glass. The warmth that hand spread across his back was surprisingly pervasive.

He leaned his cheek against those warm fingers briefly. As families went, this one wasn't half bad.

:end:


	23. candy/amedama

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This? Is food porn. Plain and simple.

Matt came home with a small, gold bag tucked under his arm. It was such a sight. Huge bear of a man, rugged in the dim light, all eyebrows and stubble and shoulders, but with a glitter of amber beneath his elbow like a purse. Mohinder chuckled to himself. "How did the interview go?"

"OK. They said they wanted to wait for my strength to come back, then they'd have to put me through testing again. Said the letter from the FBI was a huge plus, but not enough to entirely make up for the suspension. So I kind of have to start from scratch."

Mohinder was dusting. Matt watched him run a damp rag over the top of the bookcase, standing on his toes and trying to peer over it like a child after a staircase railing late on Christmas Eve. Matt shrugged off his coat, put his gloves in the pocket, and hung it up on the coatstand near the door. The brass knobs clattered at him. He sat the bag on the table. "Went by the hospital to have them look at the place that's been itching me. They say it's normal. This nurse, Emily? Apparently had been waiting for me to come so she could give me this. She said it was just season's greetings, but... yeah. That's not happening."

"I don't blame you. It's a little forward." Mohinder wandered over, read the widely spaced letters on the bag. "Godiva! Well, she must really like you."

Matt waved his hand slightly, nonplussed. "I'm really more of a Snickers guy myself. None of that fancy stuff. I was thinking I’d give it to Molly."

In a flash, Mohinder was in front of him with folded arms. "Don’t you dare," he warned sternly. "First off, she would be impossible to scrape off the ceiling for weeks. And she wouldn’t appreciate it. This is chocolate for adults."

Matt grinned. "Oh, I see how it is. You’ve got a sweet tooth."

"Perhaps a slight one. I prefer to think of myself as a gourmet," he declared in an overly snooty voice.

"You can’t even keep a straight face when saying that," Matt observed.

"At least I don’t eat Snickers," responded Mohinder disdainfully. "Even the _name_ of that candy is laughing at you for eating it."

"You should try it sometime. So what, are we going to wolf down the whole box while she’s asleep?"

Mohinder paused a moment, then nodded. "Yes. With wine."

Matt made a gagging noise. "Why do you have to ruin perfectly good chocolate with wine?"

"You’ll see," Mohinder said, smiling.

* * *

That night, Matt left Molly's bedroom and found Mohinder at the table, his eyes lit up along with two candles. Their flames flickered in the half-full glasses of wine and small white saucers that sat in front of Mohinder's chair and the one opposite him. In the center of the table, evenly spaced between candles from east to west and wine glasses from north to south, was the box of Godiva chocolates.

Matt blanched. "This is a little weird," he said.

Mohinder smiled, and his teeth seemed to brighten the candlelight. "You need the right environment to enjoy gourmet food."

"It's _candy._" Matt settled down with a grimace and opened the box. There were two layers of eight candies each. He skipped over the filled ones and grabbed one of the thin wafers of dark chocolate, chomping it down in two bites.

"You have got no class whatsoever," Mohinder said critically, his brows knotting.

"Not when it comes to candy, no." Matt shrugged.

"Ugh. Don't call it that, please."

"What should I call it, then?"

"It's _chocolate._"

"And chocolate is a kind of...?" Matt was starting to feel irritated. Had this doctor just invited him to crash here so he could play with him? Was he about to be turned into a pet project? He still wasn't entirely clear why he was given the invitation. I mean, sure, Molly wanted him there, but... he felt a little like Eliza Doolittle, and he had no desire to suddenly become a chocolate connoisseur. Any concept he couldn't spell was out.

"Paradise," Mohinder said, tilting his head.

"Huh?"

"Paradise. Chocolate is a kind of paradise experienced initially by the tongue but felt by the whole body." Mohinder looked dead serious. His lips curled about the words like chimney smoke around a sloping rooftop. Matt found himself watching their movements. "But you need to follow the right protocols to get the most out of the experience. Much like drinking wine."

"Uh-huh." Matt sat back. He was about to get a lecture whether he wanted it or not; he might as well be comfortable for it.

"You drink half the wine now, at the start," he instructed. "The wine is a dessert wine, but it's not as sweet as the chocolate, so you have it first and let the chocolate become sweeter on your tongue by comparison. So, cheers." He lifted his glass, and Matt hurried to pick his own up. The liquid sloshed from side to side in the deep ball of the goblet. The sounds of the two glasses meeting, like a high bell or a triangle, seemed to resonate in the air for several seconds after they drank.

The wine was sweet and sort of deep and heady. Matt didn't know much about wine, either. What he knew was simply whether he liked something once he tasted it, and he liked this pretty well. He wondered if this was deliberate, part of the My Fair Lady project to turn him classy. Mohinder, after all, was watching him very carefully. He'd never before been able to _feel_ someone's eyes on him, actually feel the weight of the gaze on his skin. When he met those eyes, it was as if he'd been knocked backward three steps; he had to look away just to keep his balance.

Mohinder set down his glass and removed the top layer of sweets, then lifted himself off the chair to peer inside. Matt was struck by his agility, the way he was able to remain at such an odd angle without wavering or trembling. His body was like liquid. It didn't shift so much as _flow_ into new positions.

He laid a small, white, heart-shaped piece on the small plate before Matt. "Start with this one," he said. "Bite half. Let it melt on your tongue for a few seconds. Then chew. Slowly." He picked another white ball and bit into it, then was still. Gradually a smile spread over his lips. "That's perfect," he said happily.

Matt eyed the heart. He wasn't ordinarily a fan of white chocolate, but what the hell. He bit into it and fought back his urge to chew and swallow. After a moment, a sweet buttery melting began to spread across his tongue, and he thought he could smell vanilla in the back of his nostrils. His eyelids became heavy, and he thought his whole skull would slowly cave in, magnetized, moving toward the sweet center.

Mohinder watched him, arms bent at the elbow to prop his chin up on his folded wrists. Matt's shoulders were relaxing, eyes closing, big fists on the table relaxing into flat palms upturned as though in prayer. When his eyes opened again, they were calmer, lighter in color. He went for the other half of the piece.

"Slowly!" Mohinder warned. "The sugar makes you greedy. Go slowly."

Matt swallowed and looked up. "Oops," he said, making Mohinder laugh. "That was pretty good. What's next? More wine?"

"Not until the end," Mohinder admonished. "Now you have one of... let me see..." He perused the small, folded sheet of glossy paper that came inside the package."Which do you prefer, orange or raspberry?"

"Neither, with chocolate." Matt made a face.

Mohinder frowned at him. "I think you may be hopeless." His frown was sort of funny in the low light. What was the word Matt was searching for? Oh, yes. _Cute._ Mohinder looked _cute._ Like an abandoned puppy. The kind in the cartoons. Matt felt horribly weak-minded all of a sudden.

"All right. Um. Give me the orange one," he grumbled, and held out his hand.

The frown immediately flipped to a half-smile. Mohinder found the requested piece and placed it in Matt's palm. The edges of his fingertips trailed along the lines of Matt's fingers as he withdrew his hand. Matt flushed, but Mohinder was looking into the box for his raspberry creme and didn't notice.

"How am I supposed to eat this one?" Matt asked.

"Hmm. Because you don't like the tastes together, perhaps you should break it in half and try the filling first. Then you can decide if it's any good," decided Mohinder.

Matt did, though he felt sort of foolish holding the tiny candy up to his face and licking out the cream. But it was not the tart explosion he'd expected on his tongue; instead, the filling was muted, like orange sherbet, and the texture was a little bit grainy over a smooth base. "It's not bad," he said.

Mohinder ate his the same way, delicately licking out much of the raspberry cream and sucking out a little more, then closing his mouth over the chocolate shell. He shivered with the taste and looked at Matt, then laughed. "You have some cream on your lips." Matt immediately licked his lips, feeling the dot of cream come loose and sucking it inside his mouth. Mohinder pouted. "You're not supposed to do that," he said.

Again with the cute face. OK, so Matt probably pretty much telegraphed his fatal weakness when he agreed to move cross-country for an eight-year-old girl who was not even his own. But did Mohinder have to exploit it so mercilessly? "There's a certain way to _clean_ if you get chocolate on you?"

"Yes. It's very specific," Mohinder said. "I'll have to show you next time. Moving on. Coconut or almond?"

The almond took a forceful bite; the milk chocolate with the lion insignia on it melted by halves into his mouth. Then, Mohinder handed him a round piece of dark chocolate. "A chocolate truffle," he said. "The crown jewel of the collection. Enjoy it slowly." He bit into a caramel, the golden insides curling outward as he pulled his teeth away, and watched Matt intently.

Matt was afraid he was doing something wrong. He took a small bite and felt the chocolate flood into his mouth in a tidal wave of dark decadence. Before he could help himself, he was making a small sound of surprise and pleasure. Mohinder smiled.

He took another bite. Mohinder was still watching him. The candles were burning lower now, and the lighting change had moved the glow's focus from Mohinder's eyes to the hollows of his cheekbones, high and well-defined. Matt forgot where he was for a moment.

All at once, Mohinder got agitated. "Don't move!" he commanded, leaping from his seat. "I'll show you the proper thing to do." He rounded the small table, pulling up a closer chair, and sat down facing him, leaning forward. Matt felt silly for sitting there with truffle on his face, but he'd made it this far...

"Very good. Good, don't move," Mohinder said. "Lean a little forward so I can see." His voice was like a snake charmer's song, and Matt would only obey. He leaned toward Mohinder to allow him to inspect.

Mohinder leaned in and, very deliberately, licked the chocolate off his lips. One at a time, lower, then upper.

Matt sat and stared at him.

Then he jumped up and retreated to the far wall. "Mohinder-- you- you're-- all this--"

Mohinder just smiled winningly. "That was perfect."

"Are you trying to _seduce_ me!??"

Grinning, Mohinder stood as well. "What would give you that impression?" His tone made the answer to Matt's question very clear.

"So all this is just-- there isn't--"

"You're very gullible. I think that's one reason I like you so much." The grin on his face was, no question about it, wicked.

Matt put his hand behind his head, flaming red, looking at the floor. "Is that why you asked me to stay here? You were hoping to get me in... in bed?"

"No." The voice was firm. "I asked you to stay here for Molly's sake. The bed part was a purely secondary consideration."

"You--" Matt was trying to find things to be outraged about, but with the taste of chocolate and wine and the feel of Mohinder's tongue all competing for his nerve endings, he couldn't find anything worse than, "You used some other-- some woman's present to me to seduce me? That's kind of sick."

"I kind of think it was resourceful," Mohinder laughed. "So?"

Matt's eyes were locked on him. On the chocolate-dark hair, the caramel-rich skin, the brittle almond cheekbones, the raspberry lips. "So, what?"

"So, is it _working_?"

Matt wanted to say no. He wanted to say no immediately. He wanted to say no immediately, run out the door, and find a nice, predictable, female one-night stand. But the moment he hesitated, he knew it was hopeless. He was transfixed. "Damn it, I never-- I didn't-- did you put something in that wine?"

Mohinder shook his head silently. Something in those eyes, Matt realized, was the real him. Flickering between the smooth seducer and the expectant cartoon puppy, they opened a window into what Mohinder was really feeling. Matt didn't need to read his mind to know what that look meant. _I may be playing with you, but I am playing for keeps._

After a long moment, he looked away, turned back to the table. He could hear Mohinder suck in a breath. The sound of his disappointment was heartbreaking.

He scooped up the remainder of the chocolate truffle. "It's the crown jewel, right? You should have some." He held it out.

Mohinder didn't understand, didn't move.

Matt moved toward him, took his wrist with his free hand and opened up his palm to receive the chocolate, testing the feel, the warmth and velvet smoothness of the skin against his own. Mohinder's eyes glimmered with questions and dying candlelight. As though he were taking communion, he raised the little ball to his mouth and took a bite.

"Don't move," Matt whispered. "You have some on you."

Mohinder's arms opened to him. The chocolate went to the floor, forgotten.

The lips that touched Mohinder's were tender, slightly chapped, warm, earnest. It was an opening, a breaking down of barriers, a tremulous taste of something new and never before sampled. And it was sweeter and richer than cane sugar and molasses and butter and heavy cream, and it was so satisfying that breathing seemed unnecessary and trivial in comparison.

So they were winded when they pulled away. Mohinder put a hand to his mouth. "Do I still have some on me?" he asked, his seductive persona stripped away and the core of him exposed like so much liquid in a candy shell. He looked truly nervous, to Matt's great amusement.

"You're so gullible," he teased, tipping his forehead to bump Mohinder's lightly.

"Matt, you won't regret this," Mohinder said in a rush of earnest emotion. "I won't let you."

"I already regret it," Matt said casually. "Didn't stop me, though. I don't think it'll stop me again." But embarrassment still overcame him, and he turned back to the table. "So, uh, which one is your favorite?" he asked, peering into the half-empty box.

"The cherry cordial," Mohinder said. His voice was shy. "It's always been my favorite. Have you ever had one?" Matt shook his head. "Then you should." He leaned over Matt's shoulder and let out a sigh. "Oh, there's only one."

Matt grabbed the red heart of the candy box, winking in its crimson foil. He turned it over in his hands, unwrapped it, met Mohinder's eyes. "But that's no problem, right?"

Mohinder shivered. Matt saw unbridled want in his eyes and slightly trembling hands. That gave him courage.

And when Mohinder's lips came to meet his at the center of the candy, when their teeth tore it open and the sweet liquid and tart cherry burst into their mouths, when the milk chocolate melted into silver sweetness on their tongues-- that was the moment Matt decided that the cordial was his favorite, too.

:end:


	24. good night/oyasumi

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "..."

"Cockroaches! Why did it have to be _cockroaches_? I keep that room immaculate specifically so I won't have to deal with pests, and now I am exiled due to cockroaches. Life is absolutely not fair."

"Relax. That's why God invented the pull-out couch."

"I'm truly sorry for the imposition."

"It's no problem."

"But it's your privacy, and..."

"Mohinder. I said it's no problem. I said relax. Do you need me to start singing 'Don't Worry, Be Happy' now?"

"Right. Sorry. Good night."

"Good night."

* * *

"Do you..."

"Huh?"

"Do you ever hear dreams? Other people's, I mean?"

"Nah, not by accident. Actually, they're kind of hard to get to, even when I try. They happen kind of fast and don't make a lot of sense."

"Oh, I see. Good night."

"Good night."

* * *

"Why, what kinds of embarrassing dreams don't you want me to know about?"

"Huh? Oh. No, nothing. It's not that."

"Sure, yeah, right."

"Truly. I'd just rather not have to answer for whatever my subconscious decides to dredge up overnight."

"If you say so. Good night."

* * *

"Sometimes I dream I'm naked in front of my sixth-grade class, if that makes you feel better."

"...Actually? It does, a little. With me it's my doctoral dissertation or my undergraduate thesis defense."

"So we have that in common. Who knew?"

"It's a universal anxiety dream. It's very common."

"Still, it's a good warning. If you hear me spouting scientist-speak you'll know I've gotten into your dream somehow. Either that or I've been replaced by a robot body snatcher evil clone. Either way, you'd better run away."

"So noted. G-g-good night."

"Good night."

* * *

"Are you cold?"

"What?"

"I thought I heard your teeth chattering."

"I'm f-f-fine."

"You don't _sound_ fine."

"I'm just a little cold. It's n-no problem."

"It's because you're so skinny. You don't have any meat on your bones. Here, why don't you climb in?"

"What!?"

"C'mon. This blanket's warmer, but I'm not willing to give it up because I'm greedy. So we'll have to share it. Plus, if you're under here too we'll have body heat."

"Do you realize what you're asking?"

"Sure I do. Relax. We're both mature enough. When was the last time you slept with someone? You know how good it is for the cold."

"I.."

"Just get your skinny butt over here before you kacha-dettha-cold, as my mother used to say."

"..."

"There, isn't that twenty times better?"

"Thirty. At least. I'd... forgotten."

"I'll bet-- oh, Jesus, your feet are cold. I'm glad you finally got in here or I'd be finding pieces of your toes on the floor tomorrow morning."

"Thank you for offering. Good night."

"Good night, Mohinder."

* * *

"So how long has it been?"

"Has what been?"

"Since you slept with a woman."

"Since, uh... since I was at university."

"You haven't had sex since you were in _college_?"

"I, um, didn't say that."

"...Oh."

"Do you want me to go back to the couch?"

"No, no, why would I want that?"

"Well, most people would be uncomfortable."

"What on earth for? Besides, how do you know I don't swing that way myself?"

"Because you were _married._"

"Well, there you go, then. Another reason not to worry about it. Good night."

* * *

"You know, there _are_ people who swing _both_ ways."

"I know that!"

"Just making sure. Good night."

"Good night."

* * *

"Matt?"

"Yeah?"

"Do _you_ swing both ways?"

"...Actually? Yeah."

"What!? Why didn't you ever tell me about this?"

"Didn't think it was relevant."

"W... wh.. We live together. Why would it not be relevant?"

"You didn't tell me _you_ liked men."

"...Point taken."

"You know, we really should get some sleep at some point."

"Yes. Yes, indeed."

"OK. I'm going to say good night one more time, and when I do, I want you to shut up and go to sleep. No more talking, got it?"

"All right, all right."

"Good. Good night."

"Good night, Matt."

"I told you to shut up and go to sleep!"

"Sorry! Sorry! Good night!"

"Good night, Mohinder."

* * *

"..."

"Mohinder?"

"..."

"Mohinder, are you asleep?

"..."

"You _are_ asleep, right?"

"..."

"Here goes nothing, then..."

"..."

"...maybe next time I'll manage to do that when you're awake. Heh. Good night, gorgeous."

"Good night."

"SHIT! Holy shit shit you're awake shit DAMN IT!"

"I couldn't very well sleep through _that._"

"Shit. I'm sorry, Mohinder, oh, damn it, how do I explain... shit..."

"Do it again."

"...What?"

"Kiss me again. I liked it."

"Um, is it too hot under here? Maybe it's just me..."

"_Matt._ Kiss me again or I will kiss you myself."

"Actually, either of those options would kind of be OK with m..."

"..."

"...?!..."

"...There. _Now_ I can go to sleep. Good night."

"...So, um, does that mean that..."

"Shush. I'm going to sleep."

"No, but wait, you're just going to..."

"Sleep. Yes. Now. Good night."

"But wait a minute, how can we sleep now? I mean, didn't you... did we just.. are you... um... what just happened?"

"Good _night,_ Matt."

"..."

"..."

"...Heh. Right. Good night."

:end:


	25. fence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was about learning to live with someone who affected you.

It'd hadn't seemed like something problematic at the time. Granted, the precedent was far from definitive, but it rather tended in the other direction. When he'd offered living space to Molly, everything had clicked. Of course, at that point he'd spent day and night with her at the lab anyway, researching, comforting her, getting to know her, falling for her like the proverbial ton of bricks. So after Kirby Plaza, when she came home with him, it was no problem. She was there with him, but nothing significantly changed. She was a child with nowhere to go, and she readily agreed to the ground rules he set. It worked out fine.

But when Matt came it was totally different.

For one thing, he soaked his dishes for a whole day before washing them. So Mohinder would go to the sink to wash a glass and would be up to his elbows in soapy water before he knew it. And Matt snored. Long, tiger-growl-like snores that sounded from down the hall like a low, periodic rumbling, like a sleeping dragon cultivating the furnace in its belly. It was unbearable when he fell asleep in the easy chair (_Mohinder's_ easy chair!) or the couch when Mohinder was trying to do research or calculations at the desk nearby.

It wasn't that Matt was a bad guy, or even a bad roommate. He didn't leave tracks on the floor when it was muddy out, or refuse to plunge the toilet, or anything horribly shameful. It was more that Mohinder was just always aware he was living there too. His roommate at university hadn't been nearly this obvious. Part of it was, of course, that Matt had settled in while he was lecturing half a world away. And when Mohinder had returned home from his travels, he found an apartment rife with the marks of another person's habits. Everywhere he turned there was a sign of Matt's presence. Unlaced shoes at the door, his preferred coat hanger taken, the TV set tuned to a different channel than Mohinder expected to see when he switched it on. Slowly, these things began to build up in his head to a mountain of annoyances. Still, he managed to keep his calm. Until that night.

For the past several days, Mohinder had been up late trying to work with a few numbers, out of the blood work of a virus patient in Ohio, that refused to make sense. He'd been researching and thought he had half the problem solved, but he hadn't quite figured out which of thirteen strains of the virus was the one his system was responding to. For the sixth night in a row, it took nearly impaling himself on his pencil due to drowsy nodding before he realized that yes, it was time for bed. Tapping the pencil idly along the wall, he wandered down the hall toward the bedroom.

His pencil tapped on wall, then doorway, then bare Matt chest.

"If you're going to tap that damn thing, could you do it against the other wall?" He was in the doorway, wearing nothing but boxers, his eyes squinting slits and his hair looking like something out of a monster movie. "Can't go to sleep."

Mohinder fell backward against the wall, finding himself rather too close to a sleepy, nude police officer than he'd like to be at any time or place, much less his own apartment near midnight. "Put something on," he snapped. "What's the matter with you?"

"It's too hot in here," Matt whined, the slitted eyes opening slightly.

"You're insane. It's freezing." Mohinder was wearing a sweater. "Anyway, perhaps you should stay up longer. That way I could manage to fall asleep before you start snoring." He was frustrated and volatile, and he knew he was starting something, but he didn't care. This guy had a lot of nerve complaining about temperatures and irritating habits when it was out of the goodness of Mohinder's heart that he was staying there to begin with.

"What crawled up your ass?" growled the half-naked cop, rubbing his eyes. "Just tap your damn pencil on the other side of the hallway, for Christ's sake. No need to make a federal case about it."

Mohinder felt like a thousand angry red ants were crawling under his skin. He rapped his pencil loudly against the doorway right near Matt's ears, just for emphasis. "This is my apartment," he said, "and I'll tap whatever I want wherever I want, thank you very much. Good night." He harrumphed off to his room and got into bed, listening to the rumbling rhythm of Matt's snores from across the hall and fuming well into the early morning hours.

In the morning, when Mohinder left his bedroom, Matt was up (and thankfully dressed) and reading the paper, a pen in hand. "Whatcha doin'?" Molly asked him as she prepared her own breakfast-- apparently adults didn't understand the finer points of mixing milk and cereal; she'd banned them from serving her two weeks ago.

"I'm looking for an apartment," he said. "I don't think I'm going to be able to stay here much longer."

Her bowl clattered back to the counter, and Froot Loops splattered in a multicolored semicircle around it. "You can't move out!" she insisted. "Why do you have to move out?"

"Come here," he beckoned, and, pouting, she went to his lap. "Honey, sometimes it's hard for people to live together."

"You and Mohinder aren't getting along?"

"I think we're getting on each other's nerves a bit too much," he sighed. "He's a nice guy, honey, but he's always in my space."

Still in the hallway, Mohinder bit back a huff of outrage. In _his_ space!

"Well, why don't you guys build a fence or something? Draw a line. Then you'll know whose space is whose."

Matt laughed the sort of sad, adult laugh that meant _why can't things be as simple as kids often say they are?_ "I wish that would work. Truly. But it's not going to."

"Why not? I think it's a splendid idea." Mohinder stormed in. He had bags under his eyes and knit brows above them; this was the face of a man who had not had a decent night's sleep in days. "You're the one who told me to stick to the other side of the hallway, after all. Why don't we just divide the place in half? At least that way you won't act like you own the whole thing."

"Guys, cut it out!" Molly insisted angrily, but there came a point-- usually somewhere after insomnia and before caffeine-- where even the beauty of a child's innocence couldn't save the day.

So before long there was white electrician's tape along the wooden floors of the apartment, making the skinny hallway even narrower on each side. Common areas were the kitchen, the bathroom, Molly's room, and the hall closet, but even the living room was bisected-- right where Molly liked to sit on the couch, so she wouldn't have to pick a side. Mohinder lifted his cinder-block bookcases with a great show of strength, refusing Matt's help, and crowded them all on his side of the study. Sadly enough, that meant the easy chair went on Matt's side, just through sheer economy of space. And of course, bedrooms were off-limits.

When the whole place was divided into the Matt zone and the Mohinder zone and everyone was satisfied with the division of space, Molly declared the partitioning complete and went to her room to doodle annoyed-looking stick figures on her textbooks. And Matt and Mohinder went about the business of making life a living hell for each other, each in his own special way.

Matt favored the brute-force approach. When Mohinder was humming as he worked, Matt would shout at him to keep it down, he was trying to watch TV. Mohinder would snipe back that music was far superior to television. "Except when you're the musician," Matt would counter. "If you can call yourself one."

Mohinder, on the other hand, preferred to be what he called "helpful." As in, he would buy Matt things. Things like a bathrobe so he wouldn't walk around half-naked. An XXL-sized bathrobe. "What the hell does that mean?"

"It means I didn't know your size."

"Do I look like a linebacker to you? Not just XL? Ex-_ex-_ell?"

"I don't care how many Xes are on it, just as long as it's on _you_ when you come out of your room in the morning!"

They lasted for about a week like this, but when Mohinder, exhausted from a bad day, forgot to look into the sink and ruined the cuffs of one of his favorite shirts in the soapy dishwater left over from last night's Sloppy Joes, it was the beginning of the end. The common areas were getting unlivable, he fumed. So that day he went out and bought a set of disposable paper plates and plastic utensils, putting them in the drawers and cabinets, displacing their more permanent counterparts. He boxed up and hoarded all the ceramic plates and stainless steel dinnerware in the living room, firmly on his side of the fence.

"What the hell's this?" Matt said when he came home late that night and discovered the switch.

"_This_ is so we don't have filthy water in the sink for a day after we cook something." Mohinder stood up from his desk and turned around as Matt came into the living room and stood against the far wall, as distant as possible from the "line."

"Great, that's just great. I take it we're going to put paper pots and pans on the stove, too?"

"You never use them anyway. What do you care?"

"I do so! What the hell are you talking about?" Matt took a step forward.

"Oh, sure. Very believable. It's always take-out pizza and TV dinners with you."

Matt threw his hands up. "Who do you think made those Sloppy Joes?"

"I'm sorry. Did you consider that fine cuisine?" Mohinder came forward to lean on the armrest of the couch. Matt did the same. They were mirror images, challenging each other over a sofa with a white line holding them apart.

"I don't want to hear that from a guy who would rather eat from paper plates than soak his dishes. What's next? You gonna start wearing paper clothes so you don't have to do laundry?"

"At least I wear clothes. You're practically a nudist before nine in the morning!" Another step closer, and they were eye to eye, separated by an invisible fence over a thin white line.

"How would you know? You're never awake!" Toe to toe on the line, they glared, teeth clenched, fists curled, daring the other to take a step forward.

"I'm trying to catch up on the sleep I lose because of your snoring!"

Matt took one step forward. Mohinder looked down; Matt's gaze followed his. His foot was just over the line.

When Mohinder was young, he'd had a pair of disc magnets, each with a north side and a south side. They fascinated him. He would push the like poles together, feeling the little slabs of metal rebel against his insistent fingers. They did not want to be close to each other, not in the slightest. But he kept pushing them together, and always at the last minute, one would jump into the air and flip backwards, exposing the other pole. And the two discs would suddenly slap together.

And perhaps that's what happened at that moment, because Matt's hands were suddenly on the back of Mohinder's head and on his waist, and his mouth was devouring Mohinder's with an urgency that was nothing short of magnetic. It was as though someone had flipped a switch and the electricity that had been sparking between them was now flowing through them both. Mohinder's tongue was in his mouth and his fingers were in his hair, stroking it, reaching down beneath his shirt where his neck met his back to massage the soft skin there. His back was arched backwards so he bent not once but twice over the line; once where his knees were soft and trembling, one where his head was thrown back in abandon. There wasn't a spot where their bodies weren't pressed together. Matt's feet were just outside of Mohinder's, steady and firm, one on each side of the line of tape.

And then, just as abruptly, they were thrown back. Mohinder staggered. Matt gaped, wiping his lips as though he'd just been doused with water. His eyes were huge globes of shock. They stared at one another suspiciously, waiting to see who would first take advantage of this attack of opportunity.

Brute force won out. "That was just about the stupidest thing I've ever done," Matt spat. "Next to thinking I could live with you, that is."

Mohinder couldn't find the words to reply. His guts were awash in confusion, and he thought he might be sick.

Matt stared another moment, and then turned toward the front door. "If Molly asks, I've gone to a hotel for the night. I'll be back tomorrow to start getting my stuff," he said shortly. A few hurried motions of gathering and donning later, and he was out the door, the doorknob rattling and falling silent again. Mohinder watched the apartment become still and dark, and he suddenly realized that he'd moved forward as Matt had gone, that he was now standing on the wrong side of the fence. Although no one was there to scold him, he found himself retreating carefully.

He tried to sleep that night, but when the clock read a bleary red 4:00, he got up again and stomped to his desk. Still safely on his side of the fence, he pondered.

Here he was, alone and absolutely undisturbed and heartbreakingly, achingly lonely, with Matt's taste on his lips and the feel of him, warm and full, echoing in his sad and empty hands.

Since when had those snores become the rhythm by which he fell asleep?

When had he learned (tonight's episode excepted) to roll up his sleeves and revel in the softness of the soapy water?

And how long had it been since he'd stopped thinking of this apartment as _his_ and started thinking of it as _theirs?_

It hadn't been, he realized, about Matt being impossible to live with. It had been about becoming accustomed to the rhythms of another person's life, letting them rub against and chafe and erode his own. It was about learning to live with someone who affected you. Whose life, whose existence changed your own.

Matt had been different from his college roommate because Matt wasn't just a roommate. He was someone who'd changed Mohinder's life just by appearing in it.

He was important to him.

He was...

Matt was...

Matt was bursting through the door.

"OK, you're going to think I'm crazy," he said as soon as he saw Mohinder standing there, "but I actually got a hotel room but I couldn't sleep and I realized it was because your pencil tapping is what tells me what time it is and I didn't know it was time for sleep until you did it, so that time never came. So I came home to see if you would tap your pencil at me, and to see if you might want to rethink this whole fence thing because I think maybe that wasn't such a great idea after all, because I think I may-- I think I kind of like living with you, and if you can somehow manage to put up with me, I think we could really make this work, and Mohinder, would you think I was really crazy if I told you I'm not sorry about kissing you and I'd like to do it again and I mean _right now_?"

Mohinder stepped over the line just about as fast as he could.

Matt ran to him, folded him up in his arms, and kissed him hard. Mohinder's spine arched back and he forgot the world. Forgot himself, forgot to breathe, could only feel Matt above him and around him and so well settled in his heart that it was all he could do to contain his happiness or he might spill over, burst like a water balloon all over the room.

When they'd finished prying up all the tape from the floor, tossing it away triumphantly and washing their sticky hands together in the kitchen sink, Matt grabbed a small plastic bag he'd brought in with him. "Bought you a present," he said. "Just in case." Mohinder reached inside and brought out a small package of bright orange ear plugs.

"Just trying to be helpful," Matt shrugged.

Mohinder arched his eyebrows and then laughed, nodding. "These have the potential to be very helpful." he said. "If they're strong enough."

"Because my snoring is that damn bad?" Matt laughed. "Damn. I'm glad I can't hear myself."

Then he shuddered. There was a scientist with his arms around him and a wicked glint in his eye. "Because you are not sleeping all the way across the hall tonight."

:end:  



	26. if only i could make you mine/boku no mono ni nareba ii no ni

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Matt talks to his beer bottle.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic is actually pretty much based on a mistranslation of the original Japanese prompt. The translation should really be "if only you would be mine," but my imagination seized on the "make you" part; oh well, I liked the results. Hope you did too.

I have a confession to make.

My confession is that sometimes, I wish I were a Bad Guy. Honest to God, I do. The thing is, I could be. I mean, look at me. Not only can I read minds, now I can actually _write_ them. I can make people do things. That's classic supervillain material. If this were a comic book, I would make Batman fight a mind-wiped Robin, then, during our big fistfight, I could say, "You can't win, Batman! I know every move you think of!" That'd be truly cool.

There's a couple of things in the way of that, though. First off, I'm way too chickenshit to face off against a guy like Batman. Good thing he doesn't exist. Second, I have this annoying problem of being a serious, classic, Type A Good Guy. I'm a cop, for crying out loud. I hunt down Bad Guys and lock them away. And I'm a dad. (Geez, I still get a thrill out of saying that.) I have a little girl with her own power and I have to be a good role model to her.

But the main reason I'm not a supervillain is lack of imagination. If I were a villain, what would I "vill"? Who needs to rob a bank when your roommate has a boss with unlimited resources? What am I gonna do, kidnap my ex-wife out of revenge? Threaten the kids of the prick who's giving me grief at work? Pathetic. There's nothing to _do_ with my power that benefits me. So forget villaindom. It ain't worth it.

OK, there is _one_ thing I'd kinda like to do.

I'd like to make that man over there get up from his desk, turn around, come over here, and put his sexy hands on my face so he can let me kiss him _stupid._ I mean, really make out with the guy. Maybe even more than make out. Definitely more than make out. I'd like to put a thought in his head to the effect of "God DAMN am I ever in love with that cop I live with."

That's where the conscience part comes into play, though. I'm too good of a guy. Hell, I'm too good of a guy to even say how I feel. There's too much risk there, too much of a chance that we'd end up in a screaming fight and scar our kid for life. (Yeah, like getting psychic nightmares and facing off against a serial killer have left no scars whatsoever. Hey, at least I know better than to compound things, right?)

But still, sometimes I wish I had the intestinal fortitude to _make_ him want me. There are times I amuse myself by playing certain scenarios in my mind.

Like, for instance, I dull his brain so he ends up bumping into me in the hallway an awful lot. So there's lots of the whole physical contact thing. Lots of moments where his skin is on mine and I get a feel of that incredible lean body of his. Maybe even his mouth near mine. And I say, "Why, Mohinder--" --god, I love that name, what an amazing sound it's got-- "--are you doing that on purpose?" And I make him think, _You know what? I am!_

Or, say, I sneak a fantasy about me into his head once or twice when he's just dozing off so it seeps into his brain. And then I pretend to notice very slowly over the next few weeks as he stares at me, contemplating what it could mean that he keeps having dreams about me, and then, sometime when he's feeling vulnerable and weak, I decide to corner him with the news that I've been dreaming about him constantly and I think it means I want him and what should we do? Then he'd have to admit it's the same with him, and we can only fall into each other's arms.

Or, I confuse him into thinking I'm not in the shower, so he goes in to take a shower and there I am, and...

Well. You get the picture.

("You" being a beer bottle. But hey, a friend's a friend, right?)

As for all the details-- how did I come to fall in love with him, what about the whole gay thing, what are the implications for Molly-- that's all they are, details. The important part is, I really am sick with love for him, and I'm too good of a guy to do something about it. You know that saying about nice guys finish last? That started right here. I am that nice guy.

At least nice guys finish at all. It could be that we get disqualified.

But wait a minute, Mr. Nice Guy, you might say (if you weren't a beer bottle, that is). How do you know he doesn't feel the same way? Nothing ventured, nothing gained, right? Well, right. I don't know. Except for the fact that he's so far out of my league I would need a hyperdrive to get there from here. (What, you didn't get the geek bit from the Batman reference?)

Incidentally, I'm not so much of a nice guy that I don't occasionally listen in on his thoughts, but quite frankly? Not worth the effort. It's like living with Mork from Ork. He doesn't think in English half the time, and when he does it's stuff that's so academic that I start to fall asleep, same as I did in ninth-grade chemistry. The only two words I remember from that class are "covalent bond." Mostly because I doodled a guy with a gun and sunglasses saying "I'm Bond. Covalent Bond," and my friend Leonard thought it was hysterical.

But you're right, there's nothing he's done that tells me he has no interest.

If anything, I've had a few clues in the opposite direction. There are times I catch him looking at me. Usually when I'm with Molly, though, so it could just be parental concern. I think he gets jealous when I'm with her. Which is ridiculous because she adores him. I'm not jealous when they're hanging out. Well, OK, a little. Problem is, I think maybe I don't know who I'm jealous of. (Ah, there's my solution! Become an eight-year-old girl and Mohinder will fall all over me!)

And yeah, there was the time when I made some really bad pun-- I think I repressed it, cause I can't remember for the life of me-- and Molly rolled her eyes and groaned and Mohinder laughed himself silly for a bit longer than I would have thought a guy normally would. I remember smiling at him and the way he smiled back sort of gave me a bit of a lump in my throat. Like the smile was saying something besides "Parkman, you big dork." But what can you interpret from a smile, really?

OK, OK, so it's more than just smiles. He, uh, he's kind of a touchy-feely sort of guy. It's always with the hand on my arm or his shoulder sort of rubbing mine if we're looking at something together, and it's really, well, it's really _nice,_ but it's also really kind of disconcerting. I mean, how do I know if he's doing that because of who he is, or if he's doing that because of who I am? You know?

I'll tell you something, though. If I were able to get him, I would make it so worth his while.

If he were mine I would learn everything I could about genetics so he could talk to me about work and know that it wasn't falling on Dumbo ears. I'd really try to listen hard and understand. I have a little fantasy that some dumbass comment I make might be the answer to one of his big scientific inquiries, like the dad in "Independence Day" who makes an offhand remark about catching a cold and ends up saving the planet. And Mohinder would be so grateful and when he won his Nobel Prize or whatever he'd just be all over me and we would have Nobel-quality nookie.

If he were mine I would give up expensive coffee entirely. Why? So I could save up money to take him and Molly to Disney World. Or, if Disney World has gotten too expensive, just to take little weekend excursions up and down the coast. Boston. Cape Cod. Baltimore. D.C. Everywhere. And we could get away for a few days at a time and have a little bit of magic every so often.

If he were mine, god, I would go down to Greenwich and ask around for the best GLBT bookstores so I could read up on how to do all the things to him that I want so badly to do and wouldn't act like an absolute ignorant jackass once I got the chance to do them. I would blow that man's mind. (No, I don't want to know how you thought I would end that sentence.)

Mostly, if he were mine I would do absolutely everything and anything to make him feel safe, appreciated, loved, secure. To make sure he always knew I was his, too. Hell, I already am his... he just doesn't know it.

Ah well. Nice guys finish last.

And speaking of nice guys, this one has just slammed his pen down on the desk and gotten up, looking kinda frustrated. God, so handsome even when he's frustrated. He's heading slowly for the kitchen, and it's too easy just to sit back and watch and let the fantasies wash over me of all the things I'd do if I could only make him mine.

_I'd take him to the symphony and the theatre._ How interesting since I never go there, but sure, why not...

_and I'd ask him to take me to football games and sports bars,_ that sounds way better, but something's wrong here...

_and I'd teach him a few choice words in Tamil so we could whisper scandalous things to each other over Molly's head_ and these are not my thoughts, I don't think...

_and I'd never let him sleep in that ratty twin bed again_ and that's it. I stand up and block the doorway. He is not leaving this room.

"What?" First word he's said to me all night.

I want to confront him, ask him what the meaning of all that is, but oh my GOD the panic is overwhelming me and so are the what-ifs. What if the beer has relaxed me too much? What if I'm projecting my own fantasies of what I hope to hear him say and I just don't know it? What if this is all my doing?

"Matt, your face has gone through about fifteen expressions in the past five seconds. What's wrong?"

"Am I--" I gulp and release the question, fling it like a shotput before I lose my nerve, or my lunch, or both. "Am I making you think things?"

"Wha--" His eyes go round with horror. "Oh, no. It's late, I forgot you were there and you could--"

"These things you were thinking. About Tamil, a-- and sports bars, and the b-b--"

"Don't!" He's scarlet and avoiding my gaze. I feel my stomach lurch. I did it again, didn't I?

I have to cop to it. "I did that. I'm sorry."

"What?" Like I have just said to him that I came from Mars. "You're sorry for--"

"I made you think those things. Just now. Right?"

"Well. Yes." He shuffles his feet. I adore that habit of his. This is not the time or place for me to be adoring anything. I should be on my knees begging for forgiveness.

"I must be having trouble controlling it-- I didn't mean to, I just must be doing it without thinking--"

"Matt." Suddenly his voice is firm and I have shivers and a fever all at once. "Not like that."

I am sinking to the couch again. I am so lost. "Not like what?"

In answer, Mohinder marches back to his desk. He's handsome when he's determined, too. Jesus, he's handsome when he's _breathing._ He rips a page out of his notebook and avoids my eyes as he hands it to me...

_(I must remember not to do something passive-aggressive like leaving this out where he can see it.)_

_11:05 P.M._

_i don't know why I'm bothering to timestamp this page. there is no chance in hell I'm going to write anything remotely work-related. Not when he's sitting there behind me with that pensive look on his face_

_Damn it, Matt_

_Why'd you have to decide to have your nightcap here? I don't even need to turn around to know how you must look with your head back and the beer bottle clutched in your hand._

_ahh. I almost want to draw hearts around his name. pathetic. suresh. pathetic._

_Ways We Could Get Together_  
1) I could march right over and tell him I'm in love with him.  
2) I could fold this paper into a paper airplane and throw it at him.  
3) I could ask him to read my mind and tell him that way.  
4) I could just get up and walk over to that couch and put my hands on his face and kiss him and he could kiss me back. 

_Ways We Could Not Get Together_  
1) I could keep my mouth shut  
2) I could keep my fantasies on this piece of paper  
3) I could stop thinking in English, period  
4) I could get up and walk over to that couch and put my hands on his face and kiss him and he could run like hell in the other direction. 

_"Falling in love with raging heterosexuals SUCKS." --Quotable quotes by Mohinder Suresh, Ph.D._

_I wish I was the one with mind-control powers.... damn... mmmm, Sex Slave Matt Parkman. (Moral compass? What moral compass? Hah!)_

_Things I'd Like to Do to Him_  
1) (censored)  
2) (censored)  
3) (censored)  
you get the idea. 

_("You" being a piece of paper. Friends are friends, though.)_

_Oh just give me your powers for just TWO SECONDS Matt so I can know how you feel about me_  
whether you notice what I'm trying to say when I smile at you  
whether you feel it when I touch you "casually"  
whether you know I'm just as jealous of molly as I am of you when you're together 

_(Hell, I'm jealous of that beer bottle right now to have his hand wrapped around it. Damn. Calm DOWN)_

_Matt Matt Matt Matt MattmattmattmattmattMatt_

_you are a great gigantic idiot of a moron of a fool and I love you so very very very much_

_damn it!  
_

A thousand volts of electricity go through me as the words resolve themselves one at a time and go dancing in and out of legibility. I ask the dumbest question ever. "Is this true?"

"Wh... which part?" Those dark eyes that move so quickly won't land on me; they're hovering anywhere and everywhere else.

"I don't know, pick one! The part that's all censored. The part where you have written my name fifteen times. The part where--" I put my head in my hands. "The part where I'm not imagining this. The part where it's not just me thinking, 'Wouldn't it be nice if...'?"

Mohinder is still standing. He takes back the paper, folds it up carefully like it is something delicate and fragile. "If what?"

_...if I could only make you mine..._

I feel something at my forehead. There is a scientist standing over me with a sad smile on his face. One of his hands is very tentatively stroking my hair, beginning at the ruffle of my hairline and pulling back, then starting again.

"I've been so scared to do this," he whispers, "to touch you like this..."

"Why?" I'm just as quiet, although I know the answer just as well as he does. I see my own hand rising, moving toward his waist. It's a little hard to breathe.

When the hand makes contact, Mohinder shuts his eyes briefly, swallowing. "I'm so afraid, still," he admitted. "Don't let this be another daydream. Another daydream and I might break..."

Courage fills me. "No. No more daydreams." I've grabbed him with my other hand now and I'm pulling him down so he's on my lap, thigh against thigh in weight and warmth. "No more daydreams. I swore to myself, if you were mine I'd protect you." I can hear fire in my own voice and I am afraid of it, but it's gonna come if it's gonna come and all I can do is let it burn through me. "Never ever give you a reason to doubt or fear ever again. Never let you break..."  
  
"Please..." I don't know what he's pleading for and I don't think he knows either. My hands are on his shoulders. Fingertips tracing up his neck toward his jaw. His skin under mine is, wow, there aren't words for it.

"So it can't be a daydream. Because I'm not a Bad Guy, right? I don't break people, I don't make them do things they don't want to do, right? So this has to be real, you _have_ to love me because if you don't... oh, what the hell am I saying?"

"Matt..." He has fingers on my face now, and I think I'm surrounded by him or drowning in him or something, "it's _you_ who has to love _me_... because if you don't..."

I feel myself say it long before I hear the words. "But I _do._"

His eyes catch mine for the first time, and it's like a match in the depths of a powder keg torching it, and the explosion throws us toward each other. Oh God, oh god in all the heavens and the earth and everywhere else, we're kissing, I'm kissing Mohinder Suresh, his lips are on mine, such soft sweet wonderful lips and skin and hair and he's kissing me back, he's smiling into it, his thoughts are going _yesyesyes_ and yesyesyes, so are mine.

News flash, folks, the nice guy has finally finished, and he is so glad he never went bad because Bad Guys never get the happy ending, after all, and who would have thought I wouldn't have to _make_ him mine? Who would have thought who I _am_ would be enough for him?

(Stop looking at me like that, beer bottle. I know what you're thinking.)

I guess Batman can breathe easy another night. Another potential supervillain saved with the power of love.

Which is good, because now that Mohinder loves me, I have absolutely _nothing_ villainous I want to do.

Well, OK, maybe there's _one_ thing...

:end:


	27. overflow/afureru

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mohinder has a scare and possibly a breakdown.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have no idea about police procedures and have made the whole rescue up out of whole cloth.

My mind moves at breakneck speed. That isn't a boast; if anything, it's more of a complaint. I can't imagine what a wonderful respite it must be to think of only one thing at once. In my head, ideas, concepts, theories run by five at a time, at least. It's practically a computer inside my head. The only difference is, a computer has the decency to break down when the data it's processing becomes too much for it. I think I might give anything to have the inside of my head suddenly go blank but for white, pixelated letters telling me ERROR: STACK OVERFLOW. Ignorance would be bliss indeed.

Matt has told me he never moved beyond hearing words in people's thoughts. No images, no nonverbal concepts. This is something of a comfort, as the great majority of my thoughts are, like the proverbial rolling stone, moving too fast to gather even words to describe them. Still, it worries me sometimes that he will hear something I'd prefer to keep private. Not that I can think of anything in particular. It's just a general anxiety. Probably an irrational one. I don't have a lot of secrets, not really. Not from him, that is.

I've asked him sometimes if my mind is audible. He says yes, yes it is, but in the way that a television one room away is audible: it's noise, but the words are unintelligible. And he has gained a lot of control of his ability in the past few months. Still, he has admitted that he prefers it when I'm gone; at night, when he is sleeping on the ratty sofa or staying up with Molly after a nightmare, he says, his control is considerably eroded. I hardly blame him for that. It's difficult, though, to have to walk on eggshells in my own house.

So that's one reason we likely don't get along. I've wondered about it myself, why when we're home at the same time (seldom as it is) we always seem to be at each other's throats. I'm surprised we're able to keep our cool as well as we do in front of Molly, but I do worry about her long-term emotional health. Children are particularly perceptive. There is no way our bickering doesn't affect her, no matter how well we conceal it.

I actually feel quite bad about it. He is a good person. I rather like him. There are times when I feel he's infinitely more qualified to take care of Molly than I am. But then he pulls something monumentally stupid like asking her to find his father and we are all about to kill each other for several days as she lies in a white-sheeted bed with electrodes on her temples. But I will say this for Matt Parkman: When he makes a mess, as he frequently does, he discovers within himself the capacity to clean it up. I have to admire that.

It's a complicated relationship. We're not just two men sharing an apartment. We have to relate in order to raise our girl, who's not even really ours. I can imagine the chuckle my friends in Madras would have if they were to learn of our arrangement. "We know you too well, Mohinder," they'd say. "You can't tell me that is all that is happening."

Well, yes, I can. Because that IS all that is happening.

How I feel about that fact, of course, is another matter.

But there are people to save and vaccines to synthesize and killers to be wary of, and my thoughts speed by five to a lane and don't have time to dwell on what I think my feelings are toward him and what I might like, in an ideal world, to happen between us. So those feelings are pushed toward the back, never given voice, or, thankfully enough, even words to describe them.

\--

It's a Tuesday night and in true multitasking fashion I am watching the eleven o'clock news at the same time as I am reading a paper brought to my attention by a mailing list I am on regarding the splicing of lizard DNA into amphibians at the same time as I am tidying up the study and considering the menu for the next three days' dinners. The television reporter is excitable as usual as she informs me and the rest of TV-news-addled New York about the drama unfolding in midtown as a man is apparently on the roof of his office building threatening to jump, and officers are on the scene.

I vaguely wonder what it is about this town that makes everyone want to do things bigger, more conspicuously, more publicly. One can hardly have blamed my father for coming here when he set out to find his "Patient Zero." If it is extraordinary, if it is larger than life, it can be found here in New York. That formula worked for my father, rather better than he'd liked, perhaps, considering his first successful "find" ended up killing him. And here again, we have on display a man who would not be content with simply hanging himself in his bathroom. (Yes, Mohinder, you have become just as cynical and crass as the city you inhabit.) No, he must bring the full resources of the police department to bear, not to mention a number of media helicopters, before he bows out. Not that the vultures circling above aren't feeding delightedly on his misfortune.

The television cuts to a live view from one of the choppers, and, as I pass the set for the seventh time (because really last month's journals should be all together on the top shelf and not mixed among this week's and earlier this month's), I see little blue-suited ants on the rooftop. I do hope they get him down safely, but nothing is certain in this town, or in this world, for that matter. I let that line of thought drop, and another springs up in its place. This one has to do with an untied loose end in my citizenship application process. I've been attempting to establish permanent residency so I can be a legal as well as a de facto guardian to Molly, and of course there will be further complications and considerations once that hurdle is cleared, but I feel as though I have got to at least make the effort. And I finally have comprehended that damned sentence after reading it three times and have moved on. And I think it will be stir-fry tomorrow and possibly vegetarian chicken nuggets the night after that.

There seems to be some new excitement on the television screen, and the reporter is shouting in a tinny voice about an altercation and an officer down and another struggling with the suicidal man and one false step and it's a twenty-seven-floor tumble, but I'm not all that interested at the moment, because there's still Friday's dinner and the unprocessed application to consider, as well as this month's rent, which I think I submitted, but I'll have to double-check. The paper puts forth a fairly interesting hypothesis, but I'm not sure the evidence supports it, because the rejection rates in the control group are not part of the data. And...

And then Molly gives a little scream from the bedroom.

I spin. Now I have five parallel racers on the track of my thoughts. _What's wrong?_ is in the lead, followed closely by _What should I do?_ and _Is it a nightmare or something more?_ Trailing behind them are the stragglers, _Oh dear God what if she's sick or hurt?_ and _Am I even remotely qualified to handle something as abjectly terrifying as a little girl in pain?_

She's out of her bed and heading for me when I open the door. "Mohinder!" She gives a high whine on the middle syllable and twists herself against my waist, head buried in my stomach. I run a hand over her hair, trying to calm her. When she tilts her head up, her eyes are swimming with worry.

"Shh, shh, what's the matter, sweetheart? Another nightmare?"

She shakes her head. "Matt," she says, her brow furrowed in concern. "I checked on where he was 'cause he wasn't home when I went to bed and I woke up missing him and he's in a lot of trouble, Mohinder! We have to help him!"

My heart begins hammering. Immediately two of my thought lines dip into the question of why that is. "What kind of trouble?"

"I'm not sure," she says, still clinging to me. "But he's up very high, and--"

All of my thoughts shut down.

Everything I was thinking of. Gone.

Just gone.

ERROR.  
STACK OVERFLOW.

"Mohinder?"

Molly shakes me a little with her tiny fists.

"Come on," I hear myself say.

I know I'm shuttling her out of the room. I think I'm bringing her into the study. I think the TV is still on.

I watch her because I can't look at the TV, can't directly confirm the dreadful suspicion sitting in the pit of my stomach.

What I see-- one hand pointing at the TV, the other clapped over her mouth; eyebrows high and taut where they come together; forehead full of wrinkles of fear-- is the sort of image that immediately etches itself on one's brain forever. I feel rather than hear her scream of terror. "Matt!"

I have to look. Even though I can't look.

The choppers have zoomed in on the action. The man is dangling from the ledge. We can't see his face but he is flailing and the camera is shaking as though channeling his terror. Several police officers are leaning over the edge of the rooftop railing. One is on the other side, inching his way along the precipice, one hand reaching out into space toward the dangler. We don't need to see his face. We know by the movement, by the silent screaming of our hearts who it is.

She's on my lap and we're watching with our hands folded over each other in a four-layer lock. The anchorwoman is babbling. I can't spare the brainpower to decipher what she's saying. I have none. My brain isn't working at all.

He pulls away from the rooftop to swing toward the man. Their hands miss. The anchorwoman gasps. I forget to breathe. My heart forgets to beat. I think I'm breaking down.

I forget that I don't believe in God and I make a bargain with Him that if He brings Matt back to us safely I will never snap at him again.

Of all the officers in New York why did the bravest one have to be ours?

Molly has covered her eyes and is peeking out from between her fingers. I curse that I am too old to do the same. My hands wrap around her waist as though I need to keep her from flying away.

He's shouting to the man now. I can tell by the way his chest is filling up with air.

Why can't the news choppers come down to get this man? Why are they just hovering there?

The other officers have extended some sort of harness. Matt grabs it, extends it out to the man. He makes a swing for it and misses. We all gasp.

At the next swing he catches it, but his weight tumbles both men off the roof and they are clinging to the harness suspended in space.

Suspended in _space._

And Matt's moving again. Down to secure the harness around the man's wrists and shoulders. Is he mad?

What if he stumbles?

What if he falls?

What if we lose him?

Then all at once they're both back over the railing and safely on the roof, and the man is crying, and Matt's arms are around him, and as the anchorwoman talks and the camera cuts away all I can think is that I am going to hug him like that when he gets home because he deserves it, because he is a hero, and because after all that if he needs comfort I want to be the one to provide it.

My brain is moving again. But slowly. Too slowly to find the words for why I want to be the one to comfort him.

Still, I think I know.

Molly's silent. I bend over to look at her. She has tears streaming down her cheeks, but she's not making any noise. I squeeze her tight, and that's when the sobs come.

I offer to let her stay up until he comes home, but now she's very, very tired, and she's practically asleep before she even falls back into bed. I pull the covers over her, kiss her forehead, and turn out the light.

As I walk back into the study my brain begins its frantic whirring again. What a night, what a harrowing ordeal that was. And what a curious thing my mind did. For a moment I really and truly couldn't think. The last time that happened was, my God, when? When I thought Molly was lost to us, perhaps. Any time, any other trauma that happened was still accompanied by the same endless revolution of a million thoughts. Even when I thought I'd killed a man it was the same. I couldn't stop it. What were the moral implications, would I be sought by the authorities, what about the family, could I trust someone who'd asked me to do this, would I ever be trusted by anyone again... the questions had piled up not in sequence but in parallel, a thousand at once, and I was overwhelmed.

It seems that the only terror my brain is not immune to, after all I've seen and all I've done, is the terror of losing those who are most dear to me in this world.

A few months ago I would have put only one name on that list. Now it seems I'm up to two.

How did it come to this? When did I learn to care for him? We're always at each other's throats. When we even see each other, which is seldom. So we take care of Molly together. That doesn't lead to any meaningful interaction. I can't figure out where this feeling originated. It makes no sense whatsoever.

I can hear my friends in Madras now. "Of course it makes no sense, Mohinder. Since when does this sort of thing ever make any sense?" Yes, but even for something nonsensical it makes no sense. I should not feel tied to him in any way whatsoever. What do I know about him, really? He's divorced. He can read minds. He is a police officer. He has just suspended himself twenty-seven stories above the city to save the life of a man he never met before and will likely never meet again. What kind of a man does that? See, I don't even know the answer to that question. How can I possibly know him well enough to...

Do I have to give it that name? Most of my thoughts don't insist on words. Why is this one begging to be named the one thing that's most frightening to say? I try to banish it. No, you pesky thing, I will not give you the satisfaction. Better to read some more and plan the next week's worth of meals and for that matter the shopping list than to dare give it another second. I ignore the obnoxious pounding of my heart.

Dear God, I almost lost him.

_We._ We almost lost him.

My brain may be having its long-overdue breakdown.

Then there's movement at the door and I'm up and there as the knob turns and he comes in looking weary and somewhat sick and my arms are as open as the door and he falls forward into them. We both go to our knees. Neither of us can stand.

He's in my arms and leaning on me.

My palms are flat on his back.

His breath is heavy on my neck.

I've lost all thought again.

"Thank God you're home," I breathe.

"Thank God," he echoes.

For a moment all I can hear is breath in my ear.

"Y-you went through hell tonight," I say shakily. "We watched the whole thing. Molly, too, I mean. We're just glad you're alive. Come inside. I'll make you some tea and..."

"N-- no tea. Just this." This? This, my arms around him? _That_ this? "This and bed. So tired," he grunts. He's speaking in clipped sentences like a figure in a comic book. I try to ignore how that makes me feel. How his weight on my shoulder makes me feel.

We help each other to our feet and he smiles wearily. I walk him to the sofa and sit him back down again. "You were very heroic tonight," I say, pulling away from him.

He doesn't let me go. "Wasn't even thinking about it. All I could think about was getting home. To you. And Molly."

His arms are still around me. I don't know what to say.

"Shh. I hear. I know."

He knows?

How does he know when I don't know?

"Not tonight, OK?" he pleads.

Sure, that's fine.

Except.

Except it's not.

Except it's overflowing and I know he can hear it and there's no point anymore in pretending.

"But tonight I thought I'd lost you. I thought we'd lost you, and I had to be strong for her, and it was so difficult to do."

Is my voice breaking or is it that I'm already broken?

"How do I know I won't lose you tomorrow? How do I know you're not going to leave for work one day and not come back? I can't take that. I can't leave it be. Not like this. Not anymore."

His eyes are raised to mine and they're so serious and I can't think. I'm not thinking but I keep talking and I don't know what it is I'm saying.

"I feel terrible because I know we're always fighting. I know I'm on edge when you're around. I don't trust myself when I'm around you, because you make me feel so weak and hopeless. I feel so small in comparison, when you're this hero. But if I were to lose you..."

"OK. OK." He's touching me, his hand is in my hair. "I hear you. It's been a tough night. Say what you need to say."

What DO I need to say?

My friends in Madras would tease me. "You know perfectly well what you need to say," they'd tell me. I'd blush and deny it.

I can't deny it. But I can't say it, either.

Then there are hands at my waist. There are eyes on mine. There's a forehead pressed against mine.

"Say it," he insists.

How does he know?

Oh. That's right. He can read my mind. I knew that.

"I love you," I say.

ERROR.  
STACK OVERFLOW.

"I love you, too," he says.

ERROR.  
DOES NOT COMPUTE.

His hand's on my face.

He's so close.

ERROR.  
CANNOT BREATHE.

His lips are dry on mine. Dry but insistent and strong. My eyes are closed. He breathes slowly in and out and I feel the movement of the air across my face. My hands are moving. Grabbing his shoulders. Clinging to him. I'm trembling. My body is alight like a thousand candles are burning steadily within it.

We let go and look at each other and smile shakily.

"Was that so hard?" he asks.

And there's another beat of silence, and then I'm in his arms and he's folding me up and I feel safe and he's kissing the top of my head and telling me something with the word "always" in it and I can only think one thing.

One thing that keeps repeating over and over.

_I'm happy._

STACK OVERFLOW.  
NO ERROR WHATSOEVER.

:end:


	28. Wada Calcium CD3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A bedtime story for little princes and princesses everywhere. Guest-starring Ando the Elf!

Once upon a time, in a far-off kingdom, there lived a damsel in quite a bit of distress.

First, she'd been hunted by the evil boogeyman, and as she hid in the dwarves' cottage, her poor unsuspecting parents had fallen prey to the monster. Then, she'd been locked in a high tower far away from the world, where she was put under an evil spell that bid her sleep for a hundred years. Surely no damsel had suffered more than poor Princess Molly of the Walker Kingdom.

Luckily enough, though, in both cases she was saved by handsome princes. A Prince of Strength had come to her rescue in her hidden cottage, saving her from solitude and fear with firm hands and a steely resolve. And later, a Prince of Magic had cured her of the curse that had been laid upon her with a magic potion drawn of his own blood.

Yes, surely Princess Molly had the sole distinction of being both the unluckiest and the luckiest damsel on earth, at the same time.

But just as the Princes of Magic and Strength were about to take her back home, the boogeyman reappeared. Before she knew it, the Prince of Strength had been wounded and was now in grave danger...

\--

"The bullets missed his spine, but they shattered some of his ribs," the Prince of Magic said over the telephone to the Prince of Strength's wicked stepwife. "They did what reconstruction they could. It's now a question of whether his bone strength will be sufficient that his ribs will be able to heal."

Princess Molly entreated him. "Please," she said, tears in her eyes. "He's so strong. Won't his bones heal?"

"I don't know, Princess," the magical prince said, holding her tight. "Sometimes we seem stronger than we are, because others can't see our weaknesses."

"Then there must be some way we can make him stronger," she decided. And that very day, Princess Molly determined that she would find a magic spell or secret charm to bring the Prince of Strength back to health again.

But who did she know, besides the Prince of Magic himself, who had any knowledge of magic?

The boogeyman knew all kinds of black magic, but he was gone, slain by a Fairy Godmother who had appeared and disappeared in the space of a few seconds.

Perhaps if she sought him out...! Surely if anyone knew how to restore her prince, it would be the hero who slew the boogeyman!

Closing her eyes, she tried to picture him in her mind: short black hair, squinting eyes beneath glasses. But she could not find him. Was he gone? No. She knew he was still alive. And yet he was in some place where she could not find him.

She would need more help. Perhaps she could enlist the aid of a forest imp she'd met that fateful night. He was a mischievous sort, always making things come and go in the strangest ways, and she knew just where to find him. His father had been wounded by the white mountain goat on the hill, and now he and his mother, a cunning tree spirit with two faces, were awaiting the healers' word on his fate.

"Micah." She called his name as she ran to him. "I need to find the man with the sword. But I can't. Can you help me find him?"

"I thought you could find anyone," he said.

"I can. But he's somewhere I can't reach him."

The distress on her face moved the mischievous imp. "All right," he agreed. "I can put a message up on the Net. Someone must have seen a man with a sword."

-

As Micah the imp sent out his message to all the creatures of the forest, Princess Molly went to the throne room where her Prince was lying in bed. The Prince of Magic was there. She stayed outside and listened.

"How is Molly?" the Prince of Strength asked, in a voice so weak she could hardly believe it was him.

"She's very worried about you. As are we all." The Prince of Magic had a soothing voice. Whenever he spoke, it was like a spell.

"Hey, _I'm_ worried about me!" The Prince of Strength tried to laugh, but it hurt.

"Don't strain yourself," the magical prince said. "You need to concentrate on regrowing those ribs."

"Trust me, I'm trying." Princess Molly didn't have to look to know the rueful smile that surely graced her prince's face. It made her heart hurt. "Is she still staying at your place?"

"Yes. For the time being. I've been unable to locate any relatives, and..."

"Don't waste your time. I've seen the FBI file on her. Parents were only children, all grandparents are dead. She'll go into foster care unless I..."

He stopped. The princess held her breath.

"Unless you adopt her," the Prince of Magic said sadly. "Yes, that would be the best outcome. I don't believe I have the legal status to make any such claim in this country. As much as I would love to..."

There was a silence. Molly peered over the bottom rim of the window. The strong prince had folded his hands over the hands of the magical prince. "You think you have a child and then she's taken from you," he said gravely. "I know what that's like. I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy."

"I appreciate that thought, really I do. But in the end, you'll be going back to California--"

"Oh, what's left there for me now? Seriously. Doctor Suresh--"

"Mohinder."

"--Right, I have to get used to calling you that. Sorry. Mohinder. The point is, I'm not going to take her away from you. I can see how much you love her. I feel the same way. So if I can find a place to stay in New York--"

"Stay with us." The magical prince looked surprised to hear himself say it so quickly. As for Princess Molly, she nearly jumped out of her skin. Was it possible that she'd be able to live happily ever after with both her princes?

"Aw. No, I couldn't. I don't know how long I'm gonna be in here, and my career's still up in the air. I couldn't pay you rent, I have to pay alimony, and..."

The Prince of Magic was weaving a magic spell again. Molly could tell by the way he leaned in, by the way the Prince of Strength couldn't look away. She'd often herself been hypnotized by his tales. "You don't need to worry about that. Molly needs you. And I..." He stopped and started again. "I think you're one of the better men I've ever met. Truly." They gazed at each other. The princess thought she saw a magical spark fly like a golden fairy between their eyes.

After a moment, the Prince of Magic stood up, looking startled. "Anyhow. Once you're well, come stay with us. Please."

_Please_, echoed Princess Molly in her head.

\--

The imp found her the next day. "Molly! Molly! I just got an e-mail from a guy who says he knows the man with the sword!"

"Really?" She ran to meet him. "What does he say?"

"He says we should call him if we want to talk." He handed her a sheet of parchment scroll. "Here, look, his name is Ando."

"He's in Japan!" Molly said with dismay.

"That's OK. I can make that call. It should be pretty late at night right now, but let's call him!"

The forest imp led her to the mouth of a magical stream, and when he put his hand on the rock at its base, his magic opened up a channel to the other side of the world. "_Hai, Masahashi desu,_" said a voice. Micah held up the rock between them.

"Um, hello? Is this Mr. Ando?" Molly asked in a trembling voice

"Oh yes! You left message on mailing listo!" He must have been an elf, because he spoke a different language, and Princess Molly could barely understand him. "You are looking for Hiro. Right?"

"Yes, hero! The hero who killed the boogeyman. Have you seen him?"

"I have not seen Hiro. I think he has gone far away. But maybe I can help. What do you need?"

Princess Molly told him the story of how her Prince of Strength had been hurt, and how she needed his bones to grow back. "I want to give him something that will make him stronger, and I have never seen anyone as strong as the hero!"

At this, the elf chuckled. "Hiro not always strong. Before, he was very weak. But then one day he found his power and become strong and brave."

"Yes, yes he was!" Molly agreed, her eyes full of tears. "But if he's not here, what can we do?"

"Hiro say to me long time ago," the elf said pensively, "you do not need powers to be a hero. Maybe I will send you something to help. What your address? I send express mail."

Princess Molly hesitated. She knew better than to tell strange elves where she lived.

But the imp Micah stepped in. He whispered to the elf too quietly for Molly to hear, and the strange voice disappeared. "I gave him a post office box I keep at home," he grinned. "I'll set up a box here in New York and ask the Nevada office to forward it here. Then I can go pick it up for you."

The young princess almost asked him how his parents would let him do such things, but the imp was very, very clever, and she thought that he probably had his ways.

\--

Later that evening, she walked with the Prince of Magic back to his castle.

"Is he really going to move in with us?" she asked him.

"I don't know. I hope so. For your sake," he said, his eyes gazing at someplace far away.

"But doesn't he have a wicked stepwife?"

"Molly! Don't call her that!"

"Sorrrrry." Molly rolled her eyes.

"They're getting a divorce. So she's not going to be his... wicked stepwife... much longer." The prince's smile was full of amusement. For a moment, he looked almost like the imp.

A few steps later and the prince turned around to see Princess Molly standing still in the street, her head down.

"Can he divorce you, too?"

He rushed back to her. "No, darling, it's not like that."

"But what if you meet some nice lady and want to move away?"

His lips twitched again with amusement. "In the first place, it's not likely to be a young lady."

"Huh?"

He gathered Molly up in his arms and carried her down the street. She giggled and clung tight to him. Her prince, full of magic, always giving her wings to fly.

"I will tell you a secret," he said, "if you promise not to tell anyone, even Matt. OK?"

"I promise," she whispered in his ear.

"Sometimes," he said, "not a lot, but just sometimes, a man can grow to love another man. And instead of getting married, they will just live happily ever after. And sometimes they will even take care of a little girl like you."

"So you want to live happily ever after with...?"

He touched his forehead to hers gently as they climbed the steps to the castle gate. "It's our secret."

\--

Princess Molly kept her prince's secret, of course, but she also had a secret of her own. And that was that the next day, instead of going to school, she went to visit the Prince of Strength. He scolded her, of course, but in the end he was happy to see her.

"Will you come live with us?" she asked.

"I really hope I can," he said. "Would you like that?" She nodded vigorously.

His face turned serious. "Molly, if I can get well again... and if I can go back to work... they don't pay very much, but it's enough, and..." He turned red, and Molly wondered if he'd been cursed with an inability to ever finish a sentence again. "I know I can't ever be your dad, but I'd really like it if..."

Molly got tired of waiting. "Of course you can," she said impatiently. "You can both be my dads."

The strong prince looked at her as though he were about to say something very important. Then he gave up, slumped back against his pillow, sighed, and fell silent.

The princess herself, of course, wasn't nearly done. "You _want_ to come live with us, right? Because I'd love it if my two handsome princes would live happily ever after."

He coughed, then rubbed his chest in pain. "You mean, with you, right?"

"With me," she chirped. "And each other."

His eyes softened. "That's... not usually how it works, you know."

"But _sometimes_ it is," she insisted. "Besides, you don't need another lady. You've already got me." And she folded her arms in a way that clearly said, _I've decided the matter._

The Prince of Strength chuckled. "Well, that much is true." He grinned, and his eyes gained the same faraway glitter that the Prince of Magic's eyes had held the day before. "I'll tell you something, cutie... that'd actually be OK with me. But let's not tell him that, all right? I don't want to scare him."

"He won't be scared!"

He stopped. "Molly? Honey? Did Mohinder say something to you?"

Molly turned bright red. Not knowing what else to say, she fled the room.

\--

It was three long days of waiting for Princess Molly before the magical creatures she'd befriended brought her the gift she'd been waiting for. When she opened it and read the note from the curious little elf, her heart swelled with delight. Surely _this_ would help restore the Prince of Strength to health!

\--

As the princess approached the throne room, she saw that once again, the two princes were deep in conversation. Once again, the hand of the Prince of Strength was on that of the Prince of Magic. And once again, that golden fairy was flitting between them, giggling her invisible giggle and sprinkling dust into their shining eyes.

But Princess Molly couldn't wait one more second. "Your Majesties!" she shouted, curtseying deeply.

The princes looked at each other, then smiled at her with twin delighted grins. "What did we do to deserve the royal treatment?" asked the Prince of Strength.

Molly just giggled. "I brought you a present," she said, running up to his royal bed.

"A present?" He looked at the other prince, who just shrugged. "What kind of present?"

"A magical one," Molly exclaimed. "Something to help your bones grow back!" And from her little pocket she produced a small, slim vial of yellow-white pills.

"What are these?" the prince asked, turning them over with a puzzled look on his face. The only writing not in the elf's mysterious language was the letters CA.

"It's calcium," she explained with glee. "It will help your bones grow back."

"Did she get these at that Oriental grocery around the corner?" the Prince of Strength asked his counterpart, who shrugged again.

"I did not!" insisted Molly, stomping her foot.

"Well, how did you get them, then?"

"If you _must_ know..." Molly took a long breath.

"I went to the forest to ask the spirits there to help me find my fairy godmother. The imp took me to a magic river where I talked through a rock to an elf, who sent me that to make you better so we could go home and live happily ever after. The end."

"She must have gone to the grocery," said the Prince of Strength under his breath.

The princess decided to ignore him. "So now that you have them, you're going to get better, right?" she demanded.

The princes looked at each other again. They were doing that a lot, which made her very happy. "Yes," said the Prince of Magic, standing up and walking to her. "He's going to get better."

"Good. Because we're going to live happily ever after now."

A funny hiccuping noise caught her attention, and she looked over at the Prince of Strength. He had tears in his eyes, and at the same time he was halfway laughing. "Sorry--" he said, sniffling. The tears spilled over onto his cheeks. "It's just-- I didn't think I could--"

"Well, you have to," she frowned. "Princess Molly of the Walker Kingdom is giving you a royal command. Live happily ever after with me, you two. Right _now._"

And she crossed her arms again in that very decisive way.

"Not much for it, I guess," said the Prince of Strength, wiping away his tears.

"No, I suppose not," smiled the Prince of Magic, patting her head.

But the princess was not amused.

"Go on, then!"

They looked at her blankly. "Go on what?"

"_Please!_" Her eyes shot up to heaven. "You can't have happy-ever-after without a kiss! Get moving, you two!"

And just like that, she was talking to two princes from the Tomato Kingdom.

"Molly. Darling-- I don't think--" the cherry-red Prince of Magic stuttered.

"You heard Her Majesty," said the equally crimson Prince of Strength.

The magical prince turned in shock.

Now, along with the dried tears and the red flush, there was a lazy, happy grin on the reclining prince's face. "You are not as good at hiding your thoughts as you think. I have to hand it to her, she's the one who gave me the hint. And once I started looking, it was pretty easy to pick up on. Jesus, Mohinder, you could have said something."

The Prince of Magic kept looking from the Prince of Strength to Molly and back again. His jaw was hanging open like it'd been enchanted. Finally, he said, "Sweetheart, could I have a word with Matt alone?"

"No," she pouted. "I want to see it."

"Mohinder."

The voice behind him was insistent. The dumbfounded prince turned.

"Get your royal butt over here, Your Highness, or I will get out of bed and break my ribs again grabbing you and pulling you over here."

The golden fairy was dancing in the Prince of Strength's eyes.

The Prince of Magic came over tentatively. Slowly, still tilting his head to glance at Molly, he bent over the bed. As the Prince of Strength's lips captured his, as their eyes slitted closed and their hands came together in a tight grip, Princess Molly beamed. Her happy-ever-after was here at last.

\--

_Dear Molly-hime (this mean Princess Molly in Japanese):_

_Thank you for wonderful letter! I so happy the Calciam help. I do not know why you call me elf, but I am very happy you and two princes are happy and living together now. If there is anything you need, please call again. This Ando will be happy to help you!_

_from Ando Masahashi (elf?)_

_P.S. Hiro came back. He says, "Why am I fairy godmother?"  
_

:end:  



	29. the sound of waves/namioto

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cosmic, dude.

Matt as a teenager was sort of like Matt is today, only shorter. Short, dark, and pudgy. He stuck out in L.A. like a sore thumb. Like every teenager, he wanted to conform. He wanted to bleach his hair blond and tighten up his muscles and become a surfer boy. He wanted a Jeep or a convertible. He wanted sunglasses, sandals, and a surfboard with a painted tiger on it. And most of all, he wanted the attitude. He wanted to be cool and gnarly and laid-back, to smile calmly whenever adversity struck and just know that soon he'd be catching a wave and everything would be fine.

He had one good surfer friend. Chuck was also stoned half the time and in and out of juvie, and he had been held back at least once, probably a few times. But that just made him older and cooler in Matt's eyes. And Chuck ate it up. He thought of Matt as his pet rock, his little sidekick to be coddled and pitied. So when Matt came to him, flustered, his body bruised from a tussle with the jocks or his heart from a rejection, Chuck would take him aside and whisper the secrets of the universe to him:

_"You know what causes the waves, don't you? Gravity. The earth and the moon. And the whole universe. Pulling at each other. So surfing is all about finding your perfect place in the universe. You're looking for the perfect wave, that one place and time you're supposed to be, and riding it, living it, for as long as you can. You wipe out, man, but that just means your wave hasn't come in yet._

_"So whenever you get lost, just close your eyes and listen. Listen for those waves. It's the sound of the whole universe. Pulling you toward that one perfect place and time. Follow it, man. Just close your eyes, listen for that wave, and follow it."_

Matt did.

When he reached the peak of adolescence and didn't know what else to do with himself, he closed his eyes and listened. A police siren sounded in the night. Matt's heart sped up. He became a cop.

When Janice was a teaching assistant in one of his criminal justice courses and he couldn't take his eyes off her, he closed his eyes and listened. When he opened his eyes again, her number was on a Post-It note on his desk. He married her.

When he'd failed his detective's exam three times and thought that he might as well be in Siberia for how far he was from the crime scene he'd been called to, he closed his eyes and listened. He heard a girl whispering, "Please don't hurt me." And his life changed.

Matt still closes his eyes and listens. What he hears still guides him.

* * *

Molly's holding a shell up to her ear. Her eyes are closed, and she has a big smile on her face. But her feet are up on the table and she still has her shoes on. So as Matt sweeps by, he grabs her ankles and swings them down onto the floor. She shrieks and giggles and says "No fair!"

"I know, I'm very unfair," he frowns.

"Listen!" she says, holding the conch aloft in an outstretched hand. "You can hear the sea!"

"Where did you get that?" Matt turns the shell over between his fingers. It's pink inside, like a baby's ear.

"I kept it," she says, looking up at him with big eyes that are already pleading for leniency. As if her keeping a relic from her old house, her old life (for that is what she means) were somehow a crime.

Matt holds it to his ear. He closes his eyes and hears the waves. Hears the beat of destiny pounding in his throat. And hears the latch lifting and the door squeaking, and a lithe body shrugging off a coat, so pleased to be home so early. He presses the shell back into Molly's hand and turns toward the window, trying not to blush.

Mohinder comes sliding through the kitchen, squeezing Molly tightly. "I love that you're home this much," she says.

"Me too, darling." He looks up at the man by the window as he says it. "Let's hope it stays that way."

"Matt, give him my shell," she says, and entreats Mohinder, "Listen to it." Matt holds it out; Mohinder hesitates. He doesn't want to. Why doesn't he want to?

"Listen to it," she says again. "It sounds like the ocean." She wonders if maybe they don't make shells like that in India. "Don't you want to?"

He smiles in defeat. "I couldn't say no to you," he says, and takes it. She's watching eagerly. He holds it up to his ear. Closes his eyes. Listens to the sound of waves. And dies a little.

Matt sees the slight squeeze between his eyebrows and wonders.

"What do you think about when you listen to your shell?" he asks Molly.

"You shouldn't have to ask," she informs him critically.

He feels redness in the base of his neck. "I was just curious. I don't read your mind when I'm just curious. Don't make me out to be some kind of voyeur."

"What's a voyeur?"

"Nothing. Never mind."

Mohinder laughs. "So what _do_ you think about, pumpkin?" he asks, ignoring Matt's dirty look.

"Hawaii," she says brightly. "I pretend I'm in Hawaii."

Mohinder is interested in this. "Why's that? Did your parents take you to Hawaii when you were young?"

"Nope. Never been."

"Would you like to go sometime?"

"Maybe."

"Only maybe?"

She arches an eyebrow. "It'd have to be one of the good islands. One with a mountain."

"You're absolutely right." Mohinder approves. "All good islands should have mountains."

"All good islands should have _beaches,_" interjects Matt.

"All good islands," announces Molly, "should have _both._"

This is something they can all agree on.

* * *

_Matt wants to rent a motorcycle and take Molly down to Jones Beach. Mohinder says no way in hell. Matt laughs and says, "I knew you'd say that, you geezer." Mohinder grumbles at him._

* * *

Molly left her shell on the windowsill. Matt picks it up. He lies down on the couch, puts it to his ear, and listens to the sound of the universe.

"Is it some sort of California thing?" asks Mohinder sleepily. He's looking for milk to put into his tea.

Matt opens his eyes. He didn't hear him come in. Didn't hear him put the kettle on, either. He was too busy listening. "What?"

"This nonsense with the shell." He gestures with the edge of his spoon. "Is it some sort of Los Angeles phenomenon?"

"What are you calling nonsense? Every kid listens to seashells." Matt's cross. He feels his brow knotting up. "What kind of lousy childhood did you have, anyway, that you don't even want to listen to the ocean when your kid asks you to?"

"It's not even the ocean, you know," says Mohinder flatly. "It's simply ambient noise from around you being reflected and amplified."

"I know it's not the ocean. How old do you think I am?" Big feet stomp to the floor. The sofa creaks as Matt stands. "Do me a favor and don't mention that garbage around her," he scowls.

"Wouldn't dream of it," Mohinder responds, not looking at him. He pours the milk into the tea and sniffs ardently at the vapor rising from the mixture.

"Good." Matt replaces the shell on the windowsill and goes to his room. At the door, he pauses and stomps back. "And next time, think a little before you decide to be such a killjoy." Only killjoy isn't the word he thinks, and it isn't the word Mohinder hears, either.

Mohinder considers stopping him, to tell him the truth isn't garbage any more than pretty lies are nonsense. Then he considers apologizing. In the end, he does neither. Angry Matt is as immovable as a mountain.

Matt comes back out of his room a while later, having decided that a real Californian would never have been so harsh. Mohinder can usually hear him coming a mile away, but as Matt enters the kitchen Mohinder doesn't stir. He's sitting at the table. One of his hands is wrapped around his mug of tea. The other is at his ear, holding the shell against it. His eyes are closed.

He's listening to the waves and quietly crying.  
  


* * *

_Mohinder suggests a weekend in the Catskills. Matt nearly wets himself laughing. "Right, let's go up into the old fossils and watch old fossils laugh at some old fossil's jokes," he says. Mohinder grimaces and drops the idea._

* * *

Mohinder pours a glass of white wine and walks down the hall to join Matt on the fire escape. It's summertime, and there's a breeze coming in off the harbor that for once smells of salt and not sewage. Brooklyn is not such an ugly place, not really. It has botanical gardens and museums and playgrounds and schools. It's not its fault that it's lumped into the messy New York cluster with Manhattan and Queens and the unfailingly hilariously named Flushing.

When the air conditioner broke, they jammed open the door to the fire escape so their whole floor could breathe. Now they use the black, cramped railing as their personal balcony. When they're at one end, they can see into Molly's bedroom. And Matt always listens for trouble, at Mohinder's insistence.

"It would be nice if we could get away," Mohinder says, and at Matt's puzzled look he blushes. "For Molly, of course. It's her summer vacation and we can't take her anywhere."

"_You_ can take her somewhere," Matt shrugs. "I just can't go."

"Yes, and you'd both love that arrangement. I'd rather not have to deal with either of you in such a situation." Mohinder sips his wine and thinks of Swiss slopes and skiing.

"God, if I had the vacation time, though! I'd love to just sack out on the beach for about three days," Matt says wistfully, turning his head into the breeze. It kisses his lips and feathers his hair.

Mohinder is silent. Matt looks back. "Not a beach guy?" he says innocently.

"No." Shakes his head. "I'm not fond of the ocean."

"What, never learned to swim?"

"I scattered my father's ashes into the ocean at Katyakumari," Mohinder says soberly. Matt catches his breath. "And half of my dreams along with them. There in that ocean, I said what I thought were my final goodbyes to the madness he bequeathed to me. I was mistaken in that thought."

His eyes are tearing up. Matt remembers the conch and the look on his face, and knows not to say anything. Instead, he closes his eyes and listens.

He hears the traffic, and the wind in the trees. And Mohinder humming a sad song, like a funeral dirge. He sees the sand and the aquamarine burying ground. And he feels the grief. When he opens his eyes, they, too, are wet.

"I'm sorry, man," he says.

"Don't be." Mohinder smiles wistfully. "That was actually the last time my life made any sort of sense. Ever since then it's been all madness. I sometimes think I haven't stopped moving since my father's funeral."

"Well, that's a good thing, right?" Matt says benignly. "I mean, you want to be moving in life, right?"

"Perhaps." Mohinder is still lit up with a bittersweet smile. "Sometimes it would be nice to rest."

"To not have to move," Matt echoes. He thinks, _To ride the waves._

"Exactly. Occasionally I just want to sit down and shout, let the earth move for me, because I refuse to budge!" Mohinder punctuates his comment with a wave of his glass.

Matt thinks, _But you can't feel the earth moving._

* * *

_Molly suggests Hawaii. This is something else they can all agree on. It's nice to have dreams._

* * *

Mohinder has the fan directly on his face.

"You're going to get pneumonia, you keep that up," Matt says, although the sweat on his brow is evidence his impromptu paper-plate fan is sadly lacking in power.

"Better too cold than too hot," Mohinder says.

"How d'you figure?" Matt watches the whirring blades as he sits, sweating glass of water beside him. The ice cubes shrink visibly by the second.

Mohinder tilts his head. "You don't agree?" The too-long wisps of curly hair are blown across his face. He spits them out when they sneak between his lips.

"Too hot is feverish," says Matt matter-of-factly, "but too cold is dead."

Mohinder's eyes widen. "I'd never thought of it like that. Interesting analysis."

"Of course, there is something to be said for a good dunking." Matt grins, flicking water across the table at him. "Which I'd prove if I could ever get you down to the beach."

"I really don't like beaches," Mohinder reminds him. "What's wrong with mountains?"

"Mountains?" Matt stares at him in disbelief. "They're just big, dead rocks!"

"Mountains are immortal," Mohinder argues. "They never change. No matter the ridiculous extent of human folly, we can never destroy them. They live forever."

"And never move," Matt retorts. "That doesn't sound like life to me. Sounds more like being dead. But maybe that's what you like about them."

Mohinder looks away. Matt feels a swell of pity. "Hey, look," he says awkwardly. "I don't mean anything by it. Maybe-- maybe it _is_ a California thing. I had a buddy who was a surfer, and he used to talk about the perfect wave. So maybe that's still my idea of paradise. Doesn't have to be yours."

"Waves are dead things, too," Mohinder says quietly.

"And how do you figure _that_ one?" Matt suddenly can hear the pounding in his ears. He's about to hear something that will change him a little. He's about to understand this man a lot more than he has.

Maybe it's the fan drying them out, but Mohinder's eyes are starting to look red again. They lose their focus, and when Mohinder speaks again, it's with the voice of a ghost.

"Pulled to life by a dead moon. They rise, they travel, they build and they swell, and for what? To break and die? To be dashed violently against rocks just before they reach their destination, or to weaken and fall at the shore? The beach is nothing but a graveyard of dead waves. They begin only to end."

"Sounds like all of us," Matt says immediately, not respecting the silence that such a statement seems to demand in its wake. He turns off the fan and the quiet of the small room seems to dwarf them both. "Sounds kinda like life."

Mohinder looks at him. His eyes are hollow, glassy. "Are we so small?" he asks.

"Smaller than mountains, yeah," Matt says. He feels like it's Chuck's voice speaking in him. He doesn't think he has the capacity to be this deep on his own. "But we're part of something cosmic. We carry ships. And... and messages in bottles. Sometimes we break, sure... and eventually we all die. But in the meantime, we go on a hell of a ride."

It's very hot and very still in the room. Mohinder has rivulets of sweat on both sides of his face. His eyes are red but no longer dry. "I'm afraid of some of the things you say," he whispers.

"Afraid?" Matt blinks. "How?" He honestly doesn't know. How can people be afraid to live?

Mohinder's eyes dart back and forth. "What I don't understand is, why am I the broken one?" he asks in a small, passionate voice. "You're the one who's seen so much death, who's been married and divorced. How come you're not broken?"

"I am," says Matt gravely. "Broken. I'm broken and bruised and pretty damn sick. I'm just not dead."

"And I _am._"

"No, I didn't mean..."

"No. It's true. I am." Tears spilling along the sides of his nose. "That's why I'm so afraid. Of the things you say that prove me wrong. Of the things you-- you make me feel."

"Things I--" Matt can't finish the sentence. He's trying to work out what those things are, and he's so intent on figuring them out that he doesn't think to close his eyes and just listen.

Instead, he looks. He sees Mohinder's hand, so lonely on the table, like half an oyster shell. So he covers it with his own. The warmth of the touch shocks Mohinder into speech and Matt into half-lidded silence.

"I thought I'd buried my innocence, my dreams, the day I scattered my father's ashes." Mohinder shakes his head. "But the dreams continued. It was just myself that I lost."

"Everything my father had told me over the years had been right. The things I tried to do on my own-- to deny him, to avenge him-- were spectacular failures. I feel as though I'm living for a dead man. What is it that _I_ want to do? Do I have a vision, a purpose of my own? Or am I just a minor player in some generational psychodrama?"

He's up now, pacing, gesticulating. A player on his own stage. "Sometimes I think it would be easier that way. Just play along, Mohinder. Be the good puppet. You'll never feel pain if you're already dead. But here you are, telling me to live, and I don't even know what that means."

He stops pacing, fixes his gaze on Matt. There is no small tremble in his eyes. "Except for I want to. When I'm with you. You make me want to. And that is so frightening because to live means to die all over again, and I don't want to lose myself again, Matt, I couldn't stand it..."

Matt gets up, and in one movement has him in a two-fisted hug, the man's sweaty forehead against his shoulder. "I don't know what the hell you're talking about," he growls, leaning his mouth into the matted curls. His blood is racing with the intensity of all the things the embrace makes him feel. "But it's got to be awful for you. I'm here for you, man. Let me be here for you."

He figures that's his duty. After all, that's what Mohinder expects of him right now, right? Why else would he unload on him like this? Or perhaps is is just because he's there, because by some coincidence he happens to be here at this time and place.

(This _perfect_ time and place.)

Matt shudders down to his soul with the realization.

And up from his soul, he smiles.

He lifts his hands to cup that warm, worried face between them. There's fear and pain and a little hope in Mohinder's eyes.

He doesn't have to close his eyes to hear the roaring of the waves now. He can feel the whole universe moving. The moon. The ocean. Tides. Gravity. Him. Drawn toward this moment.

Matt leans in and rides the wave.

Somewhere halfway through, Mohinder's hands have taken hold of his arms. They are trembling. So are his lips. His ears are reverberating with the sound of the surf.

When they land, somewhere else on the planet, they both breathe deeply.

"That's good," he says. "Breathing is good."

"I forgot how for a moment," Mohinder says. His voice is different.

Hell, everything's different.

But at least they're alive.

* * *

_Molly is content, in the end, to listen to the ocean through her shell and think about Hawaii. What she really likes best is the idea that the mountains and the ocean are so close together, you can see both at once. It's impossible to imagine here on this huge, flat continent that there are places where mountains rise up out of the waves like majestic dinosaurs. But in Hawaii, she knows, they do. She's seen it in pictures._

_Permanence and impermanence. High and low. Princes and warriors. In Molly's storybook dreams, they are always together._

:end:  



	30. 30 First Kisses - Kiss #30

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How do you top 29 first kisses? With 30 of them, of course.

(one)

He was just out of surgery, and Molly was plastered to the window waiting for him to wake up. They'd said it could be days. And they would have to wait until Matt woke up and said yes, I want those people to visit me. But they could, at least, watch from outside.

When his wife came, she didn't even notice Mohinder sitting on the bench in the hallway on the far side of the window. She was too busy counting beds, as each one had a number printed on the foot of it to help the doctors and nurses match patients to profiles. "#14," she read aloud, "#12, #10... oh my GOD." The first sight of him seemed to hit her like a bullet herself. Her eyes slid briefly to the face of the little girl on the other side of the glass, but she was too distressed to much care who she was. Her hands went to the rail on the side of his bed. "Matt, oh, Matt," she crooned, her face sick with concern. It was impossible not to feel sorry for her. Mohinder wanted to go in there and sing his praises, to reassure her that what her husband had done was one of the most heroic and good-hearted things he'd ever seen, that he had saved a child and possibly the world and that was a debt he could never adequately repay.

Then she dipped down and kissed him on those slack lips, and Mohinder's stomach inexplicably turned. He was unconscious, he'd been through hell. Was this the appropriate time for such a garish display of affection? Was she trying to establish her possession of him? Trying to scare Molly off the window? What on earth was she thinking at a time like this?

Later, he would admit to himself, with some chagrin, that there was absolutely nothing untoward about the kiss. That he'd selfishly come to think of the man lying in bed #10 as "his" patient, and it'd shocked him to realize others cared about him too.That if he had been in her position, he would have done the same thing. That he already sort of wished he _had_ been the one to kiss him like that. Molly's hero. His (handsome) stranger. Already, he didn't want to share him with anyone.

(two)

A week and a half later. Matt was awake now, and so pleased to see Molly there. Relieved she was doing OK. And although he didn't really know how to approach the strange man who was taking care of her, he felt a debt of gratitude for his kindness in doing so. The man was a little odd. He politely asked after his wife every time, even though Matt was in a hospital bed and she was across the country, having flown back out last weekend. Stranger still, Matt thought he caught a whiff of resentment along with the courteous concern.

"Um, thanks for asking all the time," he finally said, "but we're pretty much through, Jan and I. I just have to get strong enough to hold a pen, and she'll have the divorce papers sent over."

"Oh!" This news hit him sideways, apparently, because he tried desperately to put on an expression of sympathy, despite the mental cartwheels he was doing. (For what reason, Matt still wasn't sure.) The result was a sort of comic pout. "I'm terribly sorry," he said with an exaggerated tremolo.

Matt laughed. It was a good thing he was still bedridden, because at that moment he was seized with an absolutely inexplicable desire to get up, put those puffed-out cheeks between his palms, and kiss the poor baby's pout away. His mind didn't know what to make of it, but Matt figured maybe that was just as well. Some things were better unpondered.

(three)

Mohinder got used to bringing Molly over every day after school. Every day she'd run in, and every day Matt would greet her with a smile and a hug. But today was different. Today he would not even face them.

"Can you leave me alone for a while?" he croaked. Mohinder didn't have to see his face to know he'd been crying.

He shuttled Molly down the hall, saying he needed to talk to Matt, she should go get a snack, and handing her five dollars. Her gaze shifted between his face and the door to the room, and finally she nodded and went on her way.

"You're frightening her," he said reproachfully as he re-entered the room and closed the door behind him.

"I know. I don't really care right now. So lay off."

"Matt--" The word still felt funny. He'd been Officer Parkman for two weeks before Matt had corrected them both. "Please tell me what's going on. I know you don't know me very well, but... you're obviously in pain."

The voice was small. "They said I could go home this week."

"That's good news! Isn't it?"

"Yeah, I guess. It's just that..." His voice broke. "I don't have anywhere to go. I'm going to have to get a hotel room, and then fly back, and decide if I want to stay close to my old place, where I'm on suspension, or try to get a transfer, and go apartment hunting, and it's just too much. And I have to go back there when there is nothing-- nothing to go back to!" He sobbed a little.

Mohinder's nails were digging into his palms. He locked his feet on the floor. He had no idea how to comfort this man, who'd seemed so strong, nearly invincible. All he could think to do was comfort him the way he did Molly when she was missing her parents, and that was to bend that head into the crook of his shoulder, tell him that he wasn't alone, that Mohinder was there... and then kiss away the tears that were doubtless dripping from his lips...

That was a little different from the way he comforted Molly, of course.

But he did none of those things. Instead, he heard himself say, "Then don't go back."

(four)

Matt turned, incredulously, robbed of both tears and words. His mouth hung open.

"I mean it." Mohinder looked surprised at his own statement."If you've nowhere else to go, stay with us. We don't have a terrible lot of room, but--"

"Are you serious?" Matt knew he was grinning from ear to ear. He was shaking with relief. "Oh, thank God. Thank God. I owe you my life. Seriously."

Tears? What tears? He was in such a good mood now. He would have a place to go when he left this hospital. With a little girl he adored and a man who seemed never to have a selfish thought in his head. Two people whose very existence had made his life worthwhile in these empty months of helplessness and meaninglessness. He thought he saw the door to a new life opening, and he wanted to embrace it. Embrace them. Embrace him... and then...

And then what?

_And then whisper "thank you," and touch my lips to his. Feel that skin under my fingertips. Hold him..._

Matt turned away again, his cheeks flaming. He must be imagining things. This was just gratitude gone awry. This sort of thing didn't happen to him.

(five)

Matt looked ridiculous in the chair. Here was this giant hulk of a man, so much of that too-too-solid-flesh Hamlet had gone on about, packed into a small, shaky wheelchair and being shuttled out to the curb like an invalid. The expression on his face was even better. He looked thoroughly peeved. Mohinder wanted to laugh.

The orderly lifted Matt into the taxicab with what seemed like great effort. "Don't squeeze him, young lady," he warned the girl in the middle seat in a moment of prescience-- her arms were halfway around him already. She drew back, chastened, and Matt lifted a hand to ruffle her hair instead. She sighed happily.

Mohinder thanked the orderly, put Matt's bag into the trunk, and moved around to the other side of the taxi to get in. Molly was sandwiched between the two of them and loving it. "We totally did up your room," she said.

"Let me guess, stuffed animals everywhere," he said dryly. "Just what I've always dreamed of. How'd you know?"

She stuck out her tongue. "I'm not stupid."

"You're far from stupid," Mohinder chimed in. It was as though Matt had forgotten he was there, because he looked up in surprise. Mohinder became acutely aware of the distance between them. And she was singing to herself and didn't notice the moment they stared.

_I could reach right over her, right now,_ he thought. _Tell him welcome home. Welcome to the family. And I could-- I could kiss him-- there's so little space between us--_

He suddenly remembered what Matt could do and bit his lip in concern. Matt's expression, which had been blank, seemed to regard this small movement as more telling than anything. He gasped a little. Mohinder blushed.

Then the taxi hit a pothole and Matt was cursing, and it was like the whole thing never happened.

(six)

You would have thought the place was a penthouse for the way Molly was dragging him through it. "Here," she said, grabbing both his hands. "this is where I sleep. Isn't it cute? Oh, and look over here, this is my favorite place to sit when it rains, 'cause I can look out the window and see the rain hitting that flag over there, and it does really funny things with ripples..."

Mohinder cleared his throat. "Molly, dear, I think maybe Matt would like to see his own room first."

Her face fell. "Oh. OK." And her spirit returned in a flash. "Yeah, it's over here!"

Matt watched her skip down the hall, smiling. "God, she's something," he commented, more to himself than to Mohinder, who nevertheless nodded in agreement.

"Hey," Matt said, a touch nervously. "I don't know if I said so yet, but, um, I'm really grateful. Really, thank you. I'll be a good roommate, I promise. I can't cook, but I'm good at cleaning. And I don't listen to loud music or anything."

Mohinder laughed. "I'm sure you'll be fine." He fell silent, but the smile remained. It made Matt feel kind of lightheaded. Was Mohinder an angel or something, he wondered, to give him this second chance at family and home when he needed it the most and to never question him or offer a moment of doubt? How do you thank an angel?

Again he felt the odd thump. The urge to just walk over and lean his head in toward that smile. As though to taste it. To touch the halo of curls. If he touched him, Matt suspected he himself might grow wings.

Was this really just gratitude he was feeling?

It was that question, more than any hesitation, that kept his feet planted, unmoving, on the floor.

(seven)

"Wait a minute. You're just leaving?"

Matt was furious. First, Mohinder had revealed that he'd been in touch with Noah Bennet. And now this? Traipsing all over the world in some weird fishing expedition? Mohinder didn't need to read minds to know the thoughts that must be racing through his head right now. "I am aware of your feelings on the subject," he said icily.

"What are we going to do... what is she going to do without you? What if she gets sick again?"

This was a truly ridiculous, and utterly predictable, line of conversation. "She's been immunized," he said flatly. "I've told you this already. Now all that remains is to take down the company that did this to her."

"Did it ever occur to you that being there for her is the best way to protect her?" Again with this argument, as well.

"We've had this conversation," Mohinder said, glancing at him angrily. "I've made my decision."

"But you're her--"

"I'm not _her_ anything, Matt." He tried to ignore the sting of saying those words aloud. "And for that matter, I'm not _yours,_ either."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"It means--" Mohinder knew what it meant, but he was not interested in saying it. He was not yet ready to admit that _becoming_ his was a very real possibility. "This discussion is over. Go back to your room."

"Don't talk to me like I'm a child," Matt warned him in a low voice.

Mohinder regarded him. The great shoulders, the sharp, piercing eyes in the dim light? No. Matt was many things, but a child he was not. Mohinder had become very aware of that over the past few weeks.

"The fact remains, I do not belong to you," he repeated. "So I'll thank you to stop making me some convenient outlet for your rage. I'm not yours." He winced as he said it, trying not to think what his mind was whispering... _If you would only become mine, all that could change. I could be yours._

He pondered, for a moment, closing the gap between them with swift steps and insistent lips. Leaving the country having made his intentions known, and giving Matt time and space to ruminate on it as he traveled the world. Or at least letting Matt know how much he hated to leave. But in the end, he just let the misunderstanding hang, untouched, in the air.

(eight)

It was raining. The school bus would be there in fifteen minutes. The taxi's wipers were dancing like anxious birds, whining a little because the car was still. The cab driver grunted and lifted the suitcase into the trunk.

Molly wasn't crying, to her credit, Matt thought as he looked down at her. Her lower lip was trembling a little, but she was smiling. Strong girl. He maintained his death grip on the umbrella handle to keep himself from shaking too hard.

When his luggage was stowed, Mohinder came back around to say goodbye. He kneeled beneath the huge dark canopy of umbrella and looked into her eyes. "I'll be back as soon as I can," he promised.

She nodded. "I know. Call, OK?"

"Of course. I'll call every day. And I'll bring you presents when I return."

"Big ones," she scolded.

"Right. Big ones." And then she was hugging him and whispering "I love you," and it was all Matt could do to not break down himself. But if she could hold it together, he sure as hell could do the same. At the very least.

Mohinder straightened up. "Take care," he said.

"Stay in touch." Matt forced a smile to his face. It hurt to maintain.

"I... will." For a moment, Mohinder's breath caught, and Matt's heart forgot to beat. They clasped hands briefly, and he got into the cab, waving as it started up and pulled away from the curb.

As the tires angled away, Molly lost it. She threw her arms around Matt's hip, crying. And Matt put a hand on her hair and watched the disappearing streak of yellow, thinking that maybe he was in a bad movie.

Because wasn't this the bad-movie scene where he dropped the umbrella and dashed madly after the taxi, screaming "Stop" and "Wait" until it stopped and Mohinder got out, looking confused, and Matt caught up to him, begging him not to go, and the rain was pouring down their faces and matting their hair and as he kissed him for the first time, the camera rotoscoped around them and the music swelled?

No. This wasn't a bad movie. This was real life. And he had a real girl to get off to school, and he had a real dilemma, because he had a real crush on a man. At least he had a real long time to get used to the idea.

(nine)

Molly covered the phone with her hand. "Matt! Mohinder says he saw pyramids today!"

Her enthusiasm tickled Mohinder, and he laughed warmly. In the background, he could hear Matt say, "That's great, honey." Even the muffled voice, with its blase, so-what attitude, made his heart ache. He was happy to hear that they were getting along, that nobody had burned the place down in his absence. And perhaps he'd been romanticizing things a little-- he knew what they said about absence and the heart, after all-- but over the course of a week of late-morning phone calls to early-evening New York, he'd come to settle into acceptance of his attraction to Matt. He looked foward to hearing his voice over the line. He heard that same voice in his dreams. He fantasized about his eventual homecoming. And he managed to transmute the whole thing into energy for his tour. It sustained him, like a vitamin of some sort. Which reminded him.

"Sweetheart, can I talk with Matt for a moment?"

"Sure, I gotta go to bed anyway. Goodnight!" Hand over the phone again. "Matt! Mohinder wants to talk to you!"

"Coming!" Mohinder closed his eyes and smiled at the voice. He relished this moment, when it was suddenly right there, close to his ear. "'Lo. How's the weather?"

"Oppressively hot. I quite like it," Mohinder smiled. "I meant to ask you, are you making sure she gets decent nutrition? I keep hearing in my head what you told me about not being able to cook, and it gives me the cold shivers."

Laughter over the line made him feel warm and slightly tingly. "You sound like her. She's always telling me the same thing. She even went out and bought herself these weird calcium supplements. I think they're brainwashing her in health class or something."

"Check them out. Make sure they're not snake oil," Mohinder said in sudden concern.

"I hear you, Mama Bear," Matt teased. Did that make him Papa Bear? The idea made Mohinder tense and giddy in less-than-family-friendly ways. _Oh, my,_ he thought suddenly. _Can you hear thoughts over the phone?_

There was a silence, then Matt's "Hello? Mohinder? Did we get cut off?"

"Yes. Hello, I'm here. Sorry," he stuttered, relieved.

"Is everything OK?" Suddenly his voice was lower, serious. "Have you been able to get this guy's attention yet?"

"I think he's almost ready to make his move," confided Mohinder. "I have a lecture later today that I think he'll attend. I'm hopeful that he'll approach me. If not, I'll have to find a way to force the issue."

"Well, be careful."

Mohinder sucked in a breath. That tone of voice did things to him. "I will. Tell Molly good night for me."

"Good luck." So low it was barely a rasp. Mohinder felt as though, if he closed his eyes, he would be able to feel Matt's breath on his face.

He pressed his lips silently to the phone's mouthpiece. "Thank you," he whispered. "Goodbye."

(ten)

Matt hung up the phone and stared at it for a long while.

God, it was easy to care about him long-distance.

Without the physical presence, without the seeing him every day and the being reminded that he was a real person-- not only a man, which was weird enough, but another human being with traits that could be quirky and frustrating and sometimes downright awful-- he was just a warm, ethereal voice of concern, and Matt wanted to float away on the breaths he exhaled, puffing into the receiver.

He wished he knew how to set up a wiretap. He wanted that voice on a recording for posterity, so he could hear it when he went to sleep at night. He imagined taping that thank-you, that goodbye, and placing a small tape player beneath his pillow. And when he heard the voice from beneath him, he thought, he'd probably kiss the pillow like a child and pretend the fabric was flesh, that the smile in his head was beside him, that what he was feeling was real--

He didn't know quite how he felt about the real Mohinder. But at this point, he had no problem admitting to himself that he was hopelessly in love with his voice.

(eleven)

What Mohinder was thinking, when he came in the door, was how excited he was to see Molly again. It's amazing how quickly a bond can grow between a child and an adult, he thought. There is something about children than opens your heart, even after you've put up a thousand walls. Then again, Mohinder had never been good at not caring. Some might say that was his weakness.

So after what seemed like a million nights away, the thought of the real, three-dimensional, quietly breathing girl awaiting him kept him alive through an interminable plane ride and a lonely taxi's trek through rain-slick streets. It didn't seem like the road home so much as another unfamiliar place; he had never quite felt this was a place he belonged. When the door opened, it was the door to his father's apartment. Maybe even the place he stayed. Even when he saw Molly's bed and her beautiful, tiny face, tranquil with sleep, he still only thought, _I'm back._

But when he saw Matt slack and sleeping in the chair beside her bed, he looked at the two of them and thought, _I'm home._

He wanted to lean down and kiss them both in that moment. The affection in his heart scared him a little in its intensity. But his bag and his eyelids were both heavy, and he needed both tea and a break. So the pair of kisses that flirted with his lips in that moment stayed tucked away just behind his tongue, making his lips curl upward into a smile.

(twelve)

Matt awoke to a sound. He was still reeling from what Molly's teacher had said today, and he'd dreamed someone was sneaking up behind him. So a sound was enough to jolt him into red alert mode. He pulled out his gun and moved in the darkness, spotted a figure in the kitchen under dim light and pointed at him. "Freeze!"

Even as the word escaped his lips he saw how foolish he'd been.

And seeing Mohinder there again was a different sort of jolt. He hadn't expected him to come home, and his very real and solid presence was tossing him into the worst kind of confusion. The very safe fantasy-Mohinder he'd allowed himself to come to love was suddenly and violently replaced with the much less convenient real Mohinder.

And there'd been a murder. And the suspect knew what he could do. And Molly was struggling and was currently mad enough to not talk to him. And there was something in her nightmares that he couldn't breach. And now he would have to deal with Mohinder in the flesh, playing his amateur spy game and being so frustrating...

...and lifting a mug of steaming liquid to his lips and taking a sip, his eyes never leaving Matt's.

Matt wanted desperately to be that mug at that moment. Anything to touch those lips. A wave of lust shot through him that nearly knocked him over. He gripped the counter.

Life was getting more and more complicated by the minute.

(thirteen)

Mohinder watched his eyes as the flicker of emotion flew through them. When he'd come home, Matt's eyes had been closed in sleep. He looked so easy, so comfortable sitting there, just like the drawling voice on the line had been so comfortable to hear. He should have known things were never that simple. This wasn't some easygoing armchair of a man. Those eyes almost hurt to look at. They were dangerous. They challenged him.

And he wanted to rise to the challenge. Wanted to vindicate himself in those eyes, to prove that he wasn't deserving of such scorn. Was it scorn, though? The gaze seemed to simultaneously reduce him to less than nothing and elevate him to a place where they were the only two people in the universe, a clash of the titans in their own world. He would not flinch from that gaze.

That's when the spark of something else flew through Matt's eyes.

For a half a moment, Mohinder could believe that Matt might feel something other than derision. That he thought of Mohinder as something other than a young upstart, a know-it-all who was competing with him in some parenting tournament. So when Matt said to him that if he wanted to do something for Molly he should try not to die on her, Mohinder wasn't sure if he was saying it for Molly or for himself.

Was it possible? Because if it was, Mohinder would have no problem with walking right into the path of those dangerous eyes, risking their burning power, and making it clear with lips and arms and hands and body that he intended to stay alive for as long as he could. And not just for Molly.

(fourteen)

And then the sweetest voice in the world doused the flames. "Mohinder, you're back!"

A bright ball of sunshine burst into the room, crossed the floor, and launched herself into a pair of welcoming arms. The joy in her voice and in her mind was so overpowering and vivid that Matt had to stand back. He couldn't and wouldn't get in the way of this reunion.

Mohinder cradled her in his arms, smoothed her long tangle of hair, promised he would never leave her again. And he opened his eyes and looked meaningfully at Matt.

Matt felt transfixed by that stare. As though someone had taken nails and driven them through his palms. He did his best to stare back, to convey to him that just because a child was in his arms, none of Matt's earlier warnings should lose their power. If anything, he needed to be even more cautious. Remember, he tried to telegraph through that gaze, _this_ is what you're trying to protect. So don't be stupid.

Infuriatingly, Mohinder's eyes simply shone back with utter confidence.

A weak, shameful part of him wanted to crumble, to embrace them both and admit that he was scared to death of losing them both. That the lips that smiled triumphantly at him now should bless his own with their touch. That he needed them both so badly it scared the daylights out of him to even think about them in danger. The bud of emotion he'd cultivated as a hobby these past few weeks had grown stronger and straighter than he'd ever imagined, and now it was in full bloom. Seeing Mohinder and Molly there together sealed the deal.

They were his family.

(fifteen)

When the scream came, Matt was there before he could make it. He was the first one to grab her and hug her, he was the first one to tell her it would be OK. Mohinder was useless, an afterthought, dwarfed by the doorway as she asked for a glass of water. He felt as though an invisible fence were keeping him from stepping forward and breaking the connection he saw between the two pale figures on the bed. Suddenly, he felt segregated.

He would never look like he was related to her. Matt looked so very, very much like a natural father as he sat there, and Mohinder was just a strange foreigner who happened to be in the house. He'd never before given any thought to his race. It had never mattered. But the contrast between white and brown right now made him nervous.

He berated himself. This was not the time to feel sorry for himself. He had enough on his mind, enough balls in the air. If he stopped to navel-gaze, he'd drop them all. And yet guilt and bitter disappointment and a sense that he didn't belong were all fighting with his better instincts for a place at the table.

When Matt drew back and joined him in the doorway, Mohinder felt even stranger and more foreign. He was within a breath or two of a man he'd been dreaming about for ages. They were sharing a child, a home. And yet there was still that invisible fence between them, an electrified fence at that. When they drew too close together, sparks showered the air and they pulled back, stung.

What kind of masochist was he, that he nevertheless wanted to reach across that barrier and grab him? To see just how different they were, to see if Matt tasted like something pale and powerful, if he thought Mohinder tasted like something spicy and exotic?

If he had the courage he needed, he could have at least touched his hand. But instead, he just stared. And they snapped at each other, frustrated and helpless at the suffering of their child, and Mohinder wondered what the hell he was doing having feelings for such a callous and petty man. Never mind he was being just as callous and petty.

But then Matt offered to get the water so Mohinder could put her back to bed, and in his eyes there was the hint of generosity. The message, _It's your turn. Go to her. She needs you, too._ As clearly as if it had been spoken aloud.

And once more he found himself lacking.

(sixteen)

Matt's job right now was to go get Molly some water.

Why wasn't he moving?

_Water, Parkman. Sink. Kitchen. Right behind you. Not that complicated._

But Mohinder was stroking Molly's forehead and whispering to her and he looked so natural doing it and Matt wasn't sure he shouldn't be taking notes. Because she looked so content and calm, even with the clammy forehead and sweaty sheets, so utterly trusting. She put her whole heart in Mohinder's hands in a way she never did with Matt. He felt jealousy prickle in his throat.

Then Mohinder began to sing, in a language Matt didn't understand. It all sounded like "ahh" and "eih" and strange consonants and vowels he couldn't name. But it was hypnotic. Matt felt his eyes get heavy along with Molly's. She fell asleep before his very eyes. Apparently that song could do everything water could, and then some. He watched her eyelids dip and shut, and Mohinder's lips brushing against her forehead before he carefully got up.

Lucky Mohinder, to have so much talent. To be able to kiss and soothe and sing away fears. And lucky Molly, to have those lips spill forth in ahhs and eihs and touches for her. Matt wanted those kisses, that lullaby, for himself. Never mind that they were for a child, and he was a grown man. He'd take anything those lips deigned to give him.

Lucky Mohinder. Lucky Molly. And unlucky Matt, to be watching it all from the doorway, unable to participate. Or to even get the damned water.

(seventeen)

"I forgot the water," he said, as though just remembering it.

"Don't worry about it. She's asleep now; let's hope she stays that way," Mohinder said, closing the door after a final peek into the room.

"I feel so useless."

They said it at the same time, and stared at each other.

Matt shrugged and laughed. "Right. Sure. You're useless. You're just able to get her calmed down and sleeping again. She looks at me and she gets even more keyed up."

"Don't do that," said Mohinder testily. He didn't want to do this now. "We've both got our place around here. Let's not turn her nightmares into some sort of ridiculous contest for whom she likes better."

"See, you're even able to keep it in perspective. Damn it!" Matt kicked out with an angry foot, but stopped an inch from the table leg. Mohinder started, but exhaled his relief when the kick came to nothing. "I can't do anything for her. Just chasing down that stupid symbol she keeps drawing and coming up empty. God. That poor girl." He sat heavily and put his head in his hands.

The sight of him berating himself was agonizing for Mohinder. Here he'd been feeling sorry for himself, and Matt was feeling so helpless. He'd been here the whole time, dealing with these nightmares night after night while Mohinder had been a world away. "You're there when she needs you," Mohinder said sympathetically. "That's very important. Much more important than anything I can do for her."

Matt sat motionless, a big lump of heartbreak. Mohinder couldn't stand it. He put his hands on Matt's shoulders. "Look," he said gently. "You know she loves you. She needs you. If you weren't here, we'd both be so lost."

The shoulders had gone tense beneath his hands. All at once Matt was looking up at him, then getting up, then standing so close to him he could hardly breathe. A question glimmered in his eyes that Mohinder didn't know the answer to.

Finally, he just laughed. "Hey, you know what?" he said. "That's actually a huge comfort. Thanks."

And he smiled, and Mohinder's heart jumped. That smile, that casual tone... it was the Matt he remembered from those days of phone calls across continents. The warm laughter. The man he'd fallen in love with long distance. The man he was aching to kiss right now. Here and real and dependable and probably completely ignorant of the fact that Mohinder adored him.

That's how Mohinder knew it was all real. And for a moment he wavered. Considered leaning in and making a move. Looked at those full lips.

But for now, just knowing he loved him was enough.

(eighteen)

They stood a moment in silence.

"Well. I should probably get back to bed myself," Matt said.

"Yes. I ought to do the same."

There was a small half-smile playing around Mohinder's lips, as though he had just learned a valuable secret. Matt wished he knew what it was, but Mohinder stubbornly refused to think the words. The knowledge was there, a sort of pre-verbal hum of ideas, but it made no sense to Matt. Sort of how it made no sense that it was four in the morning and they were still standing there, despite having agreed that it was time for bed.

It was just like dating, Matt thought with a bit of amusement. Here he was on the step with the object of his affections, waiting to see if there was anything left to do besides say "Good night" and walk back down the path toward his car as the door to the strange white house closed behind him. Would he have the courage to dare peck her on the cheek? A kiss on the lips was too much for a first date back in that day, at least, that's what he'd always thought. But he'd always been a little old-fashioned when it came to dating. He used to park the car and hurry around to the other side to open the door for his date, only to find she'd already opened it, gotten out, and closed it again and was halfway across the parking lot, walking toward the movie theater at full speed. He would lose his breath trying to catch up.

Of course, there was a world of difference between that situation and this. Matt felt like he'd jumped off the normal train ages ago. Now absurdity was his normality. He a) could read minds, b) had survived four bullets to the chest, c) had lost a wife and a kid, d) had picked up ANOTHER kid along the way, and e) was apparently now crushing on a member of the same gender. Whom he was f) living with in platonic bliss as they g) tried to bring down an Evil Corporation of Doooooom.

He feared what h) would be.

Oh, yes. h) was the fact that he was seriously considering a goodnight kiss. Because there were expectant eyes and a soft smile fixed on him, and he felt like a puddle of very sticky goo. Sticky because even if he did have the courage to kiss him, he was apparently stuck in place and couldn't move.

He forced a "good night" out of his lungs, felt them scrape against his ribs as though the words had broken him, and went to his room.

(nineteen)

It was beautiful, sweet, tentative romantic bliss.

It didn't last.

Matt made the supremely stupid move of asking Molly to use her powers to find someone. Not just someone. The worst possible person. Mohinder realized his own foolishness had been never making an explicit deal with Matt about when and why they would ask her to do so. He'd just assumed Matt knew the answer was Never and for No Reason. He thought that would be basic parenting. You have a child whose life has been turned upside down by the fact that she has a special ability, and you have a chance to right it again? Your first step is to not be one of the many people trying to exploit her. It wasn't rocket science.

But apparently he'd assumed too much, because Matt asked her to find someone, and then things got impossibly worse. Molly's night terrors were torturous enough to witness, but her fully conscious, waking, paralyzed terror was absolute murder to watch. Every time he closed his eyes now Mohinder could see her slowly shaking head, her eyebrows drawn to a peak in the center of her forehead, her knuckles white against the bookcase as she begged him to please put the picture away.

Damn him! Goddamn Matt for putting that expression on her face! How dare he? Who did he think he was that he was so much better than all the others who'd sought to use her for their own gain?

He ripped into him the first chance he got. Like a cornered animal, Matt fought back. They tussled, blazing eyes and mounting frustrations layering over each other. Everything he felt for Matt was so intense, even irritation. Mohinder tried to play the intellectual superior, the one who was calm and rational and right in all this. He'd almost convinced himself it was true, too.

He tried to banish from his mind the thoughts of what it must have been like for Matt to have this revelation. A symbol attached to a murder, a girl's nightmarish drawings, a photo of twelve people who had no reason to know each other, a father who'd disappeared long ago, too many chains he'd thought were unlinked coming together in a puzzling knot and the center of it all, the key to the mystery and to his child's release from suffering and to his own sense of self was somewhere on this earth. And the child was the only one who could find him.

He couldn't afford to think like that. His daughter's mental well-being was in the balance. If only he could take Matt's hands and talk to him like a civilized human being, promise him that he didn't need to find this man, that all he needed to do was stay here and love her (and love _them_) and it would all work out somehow.

_And then he would sigh, and I could put my arms around him and promise I'd always be there for him, and maybe then there would be eye contact and a kiss and an understanding, that understanding we're never able to get--_

But Mohinder hadn't listened to that argument when _he_ had been about to leave, and he doubted Matt would listen now.

(twenty)

Daddy issues. He was going on about daddy issues. What the hell did he know from daddy issues!?

Mister My Father's Theories Were Right and I Must Avenge My Father's Murder and My Father So Misunderstood and So Lonely and Only I Can Carry On My Father's Work?

Matt was just about to shove him through the wall at this point. How could he be so obstinate? The only way out for all of them was to find his dad and stop him. Then Molly would be safe and they could get back to real life. If his dad had killed Kaito Nakamura, if he'd tried to kill Angela Petrelli, if he was still on the warpath, then it was Matt's duty to find him.

And he knew from running from your fears. Molly had to face hers. And Mohinder had to face his, start understanding that what she could do was as much a part of her as his annoyingly dizzying intellect was of him. It wasn't something to be suppressed for fear of what it would do to her psychologically. If she could do this, and get through it, she would have an active hand in her own rescue. If she was kept sheltered, he knew, she would resent never being called in to help.

(Was he rationalizing? Probably. But it made so much sense.)

And now Mohinder was smirking at him, saying that yes, in fact, he knew quite a lot about daddy issues, and Matt really wanted to shove him through a wall, or onto a table, or possibly a bed, and plunder that mouth with wild kisses that would wipe that smirk off his face and show him that Matt knew exactly what he was doing, and he'd better shut up and take it like a man...

_Shit. Shit, this is not the time. You idiot. Stop thinking that way. Now is NOT. The. Time._

Then Molly came out of her room. "I'll do it," she said in a voice like steel. "I'll help you find your father."

Matt turned around to look at Mohinder. He was still and acquiescent, like he had been punched in the gut. And Matt wanted to feel victorious, and just couldn't.

(twenty-one)

It was an odd ritual, like a seance, when they sat down with her. Matt kept a grip on the map and on Molly's arm; Mohinder sat between them, watching her face carefully, a hand draped over her shoulders. His fingertips brushed Matt's, completing the circle.

He'd seen her find people before. Every time, it was like her frail body was overflowing with information. Her eyelids flinched and flickered as the currents went through her, and the pushpin moved on the paper as though it were alive and just pulling her hand along.

Matt prodded her along, bringing her closer by degrees to the location he needed. City, street, number, apartment...

And then something went wrong and she yelped, the currents moving along her arms and making them jump. Suddenly Mohinder was miles away from them both. Something was going on between their two minds, and he couldn't penetrate it. Matt was shouting and grabbing her and on the verge of tears, and then he was back in reality and Molly was unconscious and running a fever and oh God what had they done to her?

He picked her up, carried her to her bed, tucked her in carefully, and stomped away. Mohinder brought cold washcloths from the kitchen and placed one on her forehead, then turned toward Matt. He was standing by the tiny window with his hand to his face in despair.

Anger coursed through him. If it hadn't been for his stupid insistence on using her, none of this would have happened. Their little girl would be running around here happy as a clam and there would be no fever and no agony and no clue as to how to find the man who'd been giving her nightmares for months. Damn it. He didn't want to do this.

Why couldn't they be honest with each other? Why couldn't they act like real parents did? Mohinder imagined a beautiful alternative universe where he and Matt didn't blame each other or fight each other, where when this happened they held each other and swore they'd get through it somehow, where a gentle stroking of hair or a kiss of comfort reminded them that yes, they were in this together. He wished he could move among the universes and find that place of comfort, live there.

But that's not where he was. He was here in this reality, with a man who didn't know how Mohinder longed for him to stop being his rival and start being his partner. And that man knew how to push all his buttons. Babbling about hospitals and whatnot. No. If they were to get through this, Matt would have to finish what he started. Any talk of partnership, on any level, would have to wait.

(twenty-two)

The apartment building was clean and shaded by elm trees. There was a box of gardenias on the first-floor window. Matt thought it was the scariest-looking place he'd ever seen.

He remembered the goodbye all those years ago, a wad of bills stuffed into his hand and scraping stubble across the top of his head and then nothing, no father, no clue, no future. As they walked up the steps into the building, the memory became clearer, like he was going back in time. By the time they could see the door to Apartment 9, Matt was thirteen years old inside. He was terrified of what lay beyond there. He couldn't decide what was worse: if it contained all the answers or none of them.

Nathan was looking at him expectantly, and Matt knew it was time to knock, but all he could think about was about-facing and running back to the airport, catching the next flight back to Manhattan and making the taxi driver floor it and going up the steps two, three at a time. He kept imagining Mohinder's surprised face as he walked up to him and put his arms around him and kissed him and then kissed Molly and promised he'd never, ever do to her what his dad had done to him. Surely if she knew that, she'd wake up, he thought wildly. Why was any of this necessary? She just needed them both there, needed them to stop fighting, and she'd come right back to life. He was sure of it.

He shook his head. It was a nice illusion, he knew, but illusions usually were. Molly had looked into the face of her worst fear and suffered for it; to save her, he knew he had to do the same. He gritted his teeth and knocked on the door.

(twenty-three)

A lot happened after that.

Virus scares and murderers and revelations of secret allegiances. And Mohinder was holding a gun and walking down a hallway to see his sweet daughter and hoping that seeing her sleeping face would help clear up the storm of conflict in his heart. He hated the feel of the weapon in his hand, hated that he was cursed with the knowledge that he might actually end up using it. He didn't have a problem with guns; it was the idea that it was a Company gun that threw him. He felt like a pawn in someone else's game. No. He WAS a pawn in someone else's game. And he had no idea how to regain the advantage. He didn't even know where the advantage lay.

And his daughter was helpless in their care. What Bennet said was right. Once they had something he cared about, he belonged to them.

Except for they didn't have her. Because she was awake and talking to Matt animatedly. Mohinder's legs buckled in relief and he fell to his knees in the hallway.

She saw him, ran out, hugged him. He began to cry. "How?" he begged through the streams of tears.

"I was in a dream," she whispered. "Matt got me out."

Mohinder opened his eyes to see him towering over them both, smiling genially. Something had happened to him. He looked so tall. What had happened between the dream and reality that had changed him so?

It hardly mattered. He'd saved her. Mohinder mouthed "thank you" silently, and he grinned and nodded.

If his knees had worked at that moment, he might have sprung to his feet and kissed him full on the mouth. Now he knew how Molly felt. Matt was his hero, too, at that moment.

(twenty-four)

Matt was standing. Mohinder was kneeling. Somehow that felt very appropriate.

Mohinder was the kind of guy who inspired inferiority complexes in those around him. The guy was some sort of international superstar. His fine-arts-and-tea-and-crumpets accent, the delicate turn of his features, the mad rush of thoughts in multiple languages that sometimes drowned out everything else... these were tough things to live with for a plain old blue-collar cop like Matt.

But Matt had just been through fire. And when he'd said those words to his dad-- "I'm a good man. I'm a good cop. And I'm a damn good father"-- he'd believed them. He felt about ten feet tall.

Served Mohinder right for thinking he could one-up him. Snooty pretty-boys like him deserved a kicking down once in a while. Matt was Dad Triumphant. He relished the moment.

Except he didn't, not really. Not when the moment was so right and Mohinder looked so vulnerable, so needy. Matt had tried to forget about his feelings for him. He'd tried to make it all about Molly and the murder, just a detective doing his job and a father rescuing his child when she was in danger. But the truth is, he cared. And he wanted to show it. Why not do so, in this moment, when he was flying so high?

He kneeled in the hallway and put his hand on Mohinder's shoulder. The three of them were eye to eye to eye. He could so easily lean forward, moving that hand up toward his chin, tipping it toward his, and take the kiss he'd been fantasizing about for so long. He was so close. Victory, conquest, love...

Mohinder looked down at the hand touching him, and panic shot across his mind. _What is he doing, what's going on, I can't handle this right now..._ And Matt came down off his cloud and felt his feet touch the ground. There was more going on here than just relief and gratitude. There was pain in those eyes.

"Sorry." Matt dropped his hand, although the loss of contact ached. "Should we go home, maybe?"

He was so relieved when Mohinder nodded and let a smile show through. "I think that's a great idea," he said.

Matt decided he loved that tea-and-crumpets accent.

(twenty-five)

They'd had this conversation before. "You're just leaving?"

"She's well, and Niki's not. My priorities are clear." Mohinder didn't even bother folding the clothes as he stuffed them into his bag. Matt just stared at him. Fine. Let him stare. Mohinder's mind was made up. "Besides. You're here."

To Mohinder's great surprise, Matt just nodded. "California, huh?" he said wistfully. "God, I wish I could go with you."

It took him a moment to realize that Matt was waxing nostalgic about his home state rather than saying something completely nonsensical. "Shall I bring you back a souvenir?" he teased, his lips quirking upward.

"Just... enjoy it a little. I know you're going on this secret mission, but..." Matt took a deep breath, as though he were willing himself mentally back to the left coast. "Get to a beach. Any beach. Just... stand under a palm tree or something. And just look at that perfect blue sky and the ocean and.. enjoy it."

Mohinder stopped packing for a moment, and sat down opposite him. "Not enjoying the Northeast weather, then?" he smiled.

Matt shuddered. "Not hardly," he admitted. "But that's not the point. The point is, Mohinder... take a moment to think about why it is you're fighting. I know you're out to save that woman's life, but I'm hoping if you have a chance to remember how nice life can be, you'll be more inclined to take care of your own." He leaned forward.

For a moment, Mohinder thought he was going to kiss him. There were intense brown eyes searching his, and they seemed so close they were like moons eclipsing the galaxy's light. He trembled a little.

"I'll be back as soon as I can," he said soberly. "I promise."

He expected Matt to smile, but he never did. Instead, he reached over and squeezed Mohinder's hand. Warmth shot through him at the contact. Then Matt stood up and it was all over, he was going for the door. "Matt?" Mohinder called after him weakly. "I'm sorry I said all those things. About you and your father and..."

Matt put a finger to his lips. "Shh," he said. "It's over."

Mohinder's heart swelled. He felt a confession rising up in him. But by the time the first syllable was on his lips, Matt had gone.

(twenty-six)

When Matt realized what he'd done to his daughter, he was shocked.

He wished he could take it back. He wished he could go back and tell her she could go to her room if she wanted, she could eat a bowlful of candy instead of cereal if she wanted, she didn't have to do anything or be anything just because he had crept inside her brain and forced her to. He felt sick. He wanted to crawl into a hole.

But the human mind is brilliant at rationalizing, Mohinder had once said to him. You can think of a reason to keep doing whatever it is you know you shouldn't. And Matt figured that if he could use this gift to save a life, it would make up the difference. He could become comfortable with morally gray. If the scales tipped in the right direction in the end, that was all that mattered, wasn't it?

So he gritted his teeth and did what he needed to do, and he did not enjoy it, did not enjoy the woman's pain or the final act of breaking her and he did not enjoy messing with his supervisor's mind, he did not enjoy knowing he was the only one who could get at the truth and save this woman's life. Really, he didn't. He wouldn't let himself.

But his hands were shaking when he looked at Victoria's picture. He shouldn't know her name. He shouldn't know that her life is in danger. And he shouldn't seriously be considering calling Sasha downstairs to see if she would be willing to apartment-sit while he went off to try to save her.

He imagined Mohinder's face when he came home, in shock that Matt would dare go away and leave their child alone. No. That would be the worst thing. He'd figure out some way to get another guy up there to save her. As for Matt, he would wait here at home for Mohinder to come back. And then he would smile at him and remind him that nothing was more important than their little girl. And you, he'd add shyly, and Mohinder would blush... and he would lean toward him, touch the smooth skin of his cheek, and the kiss they shared would wipe away his guilt and his doubts and his knowledge that the fantasy could never happen now. Not that his hands were no longer clean. He had to see this through, or he would never forgive himself.

So he promised Molly it would only be one day, and he flew up to Maine. And what he saw, and what Angela Petrelli told him afterward, changed everything. Because he knew just how much was at stake.

He caught Sasha in the late morning and asked her to stay another two days. She'd have to apologize to Molly for him. He knew she'd hate him when he returned. Mohinder would probably hate him too. But better they hate him than the world be exposed to a killer virus, right?

Because if the scales tipped in the right direction in the end, that was all that mattered, wasn't it?

(twenty-seven)

It was all over now.

Sylar had come and gone. Looking back on it, Mohinder couldn't remember how he'd felt. He knew there had been panic, rage, desperate calculation, relief, gratitude. He knew it had been a daylong drama that had left Molly shaking in his arms as they returned home. He knew it, but he couldn't remember how it had felt. It was like a crimson curtain had draped over the whole day, drawing the blood and fear out of sight, turning it into a red ghost of a memory.

He supposed he was suffering from some post-traumatic stress. He didn't feel as though he was suffering, though. He just felt cold, odd, like he'd been drawn into another universe and was now back on terra firma, unsure if the whole thing had been a dream. He scrambled for his keys, unlocked the door. Molly went running in. "Matt?! Are you home yet? Matt!"

She didn't have the defenses he did, so it was all real to her, real and fresh. Her little voice gained pitch and volume and intensity as she searched the whole place for him. He wasn't there, he wanted to tell her. But that fact was more painful tan almost anything else.

She came back to him sobbing, holding him tightly. "Make him come home," she cried in a tortured voice. "Make him come home, Mohinder, I need to see him! Where is he?"

She was so distressed, he thought with the same odd disconnectedness, that she forgot she could divine his whereabouts herself. He sighed. "I can't," he said. _I have no right to,_ he added to himself. _Not anymore. Not now that I have sinned as well._

He'd tried to find it in his heart to be angry with Matt. After all, she'd been left alone while he went off to do heaven knows what. But he couldn't. Not now that he himself had left her alone to go on some lifesaving mission that had only ended up causing more death.

No, all he wanted now was to see him again. To be sure that Sylar hadn't gotten to him as well. To be sure he was safe. Safe and whole and would come back to them and complete the circle of the family that had been so shattered over these weeks. They needed one another. He was no longer so blind or prideful that he couldn't see it. Now if only they could find their way back, Mohinder swore, he'd hug and kiss them both and never leave them alone again.

(twenty-eight)

TUNE IN TO ODESSA/MIDLAND HOSPITAL RADIO, 1340 KHZ AM, read the billboard. In addition to the sheer absurdity factor, the advertisement also served as the impetus for the most coherent thought Matt had since seeing Nathan put onto that gurney: dear God, the hospital has a radio station?

He took a taxi; Peter was the only one who could ride in the ambulance with him. Matt figured that was just as well. A part of him had been detached from the moment those shots rang out. It seemed that no crisis could ever be averted without someone taking bullets to the chest. Perhaps that was just how the rhythm of his life went. Crisis, world gets saved, but not before someone gets shot. End of story. He should be used to it by now. Might make a hell of a program for that hospital radio station, though.

He walked stiffly into the emergency area. A girl's thumb was mashed up. A man was retching repeatedly into a basin. A pregnant woman, her belly stretched to its limit, was moaning. It was misery, misery, misery, and Matt couldn't see or hear a word of it. He was just turned off. It was either that or let all the moans and complaints into his skull, and that would be debilitating.

Behind the doors he could hear Peter's voice. "...anything, we can pay anything, just save him, please, take some of my blood, I know it sounds weird, but it will help him, I swear, you have to believe me..." Matt shook his head sadly. Poor Peter. He hadn't known him long, but he did know that Nathan was the most important person in his universe.

He felt a stirring in his soul of emotion. Willing it to settle down, he gritted his teeth. There was something important here he was doing. Something more important than the feeling that was straining to be heard, scraping at his chest like a caged beast. He was saving the world. He was freeing a generation from the sins of the fathers.

Except he was a father himself...

Peter burst through the doors, put his head on Matt's shoulder, and sobbed. Matt felt his eyes get itchy, too. He put his arms around the trembling man and squeezed. Peter thought in long bursts of mental sobs, and Matt did his best to console him.

_can't lose him can't lose him god I just got him back_

_You won't lose him. Come on. Be strong. He's a strong man. He'll be OK._

_don't understand, you couldn't understand, need him so much don't know what i'll do_

_I'm here for you. It's OK. Let it out._

_without Nathan wouldn't even know I could do anything without him there I'm totally powerless am not even me without him OH MY GOD Matt you didn't tell me_

_What? Look, don't say stuff like that. You're your own person. I know you are..._

_Matt oh my god you didn't tell me, hurry up, you don't have time for this you need to tell them how you feel don't ever hold back OK you're a good guy go go go_

It took him a moment to realize that Peter had read beyond the surface of his thoughts, had read deep enough to see the emotion that Matt had been hiding even from himself. And knowing he was exposed like that, he could no longer deny it. Homesickness surged up through him like a wave of nausea. "Stop it," he said aloud. His voice sounded hollow and far too loud.

Peter drew back and looked at him. He put a hand on Matt's arm, half-smiling, his eyes still wet. "You didn't tell me you had a family. I never would have..." He paused. "You've got to go. You're right. Nathan will be OK and so will I. Don't make me responsible for keeping you here when you've got something to tell him."

He was right.

Matt's vision felt clear for the first time in weeks.

It was time for him to go home.

For the very first and last time, and just for dramatic effect, Matt considered kissing Peter Petrelli. Peter laughed at this. Matt thanked him and turned to go. As he rode back to the airport, he turned his thoughts toward New York and a walk-up apartment and a family he very desperately needed and loved. He was on his way.

(twenty-nine)

When the latch moved, Mohinder seized up. Molly turned in fear. But by the time the door opened, she'd already figured out who was behind it and was running toward those weary, trembling legs with all her might.

Matt dropped his suitcase, dropped his weary expression, and dropped to his knees. Seeing her made him feel a thousand years old and eternally young. He read with shock her internal account of all that had happened since he'd left, and he trembled, both with fright and relief. She was OK. They were OK. Everything else was details.

"Baby, sweetheart, I love you, I'm never leaving you again, not for anything," he swore.

"Sure you will," she whispered, grinning. "It's OK. I know you'll always come back."

"You're so smart," he said, tickling her side. She squealed. _Once again we've been through fire,_ he thought. _And we're still here. That has to mean something._

_It means we're family,_ she thought. Matt buried his face in her little shoulder and nodded, weeping.

Then he looked up and saw Mohinder standing over them, his eyes wet too. He smiled.

Mohinder needed no further invitation. He dropped down to his knees as well, stretching his arms over the both of them. The warmth was so perfect. His eyes locked with Matt's and he said in a low, smooth voice like the swell of ocean waves, "Welcome home."

Matt swallowed hard. "Mohinder, I... I came home to..."

He couldn't say it. Partly because the words were stuck in his throat along with a sizable lump, but also because he was drawing closer and closer to Mohinder, and he could feel his breath on his face, see the eyes with the curtain of dark lashes closing, and this was happening, finally, finally, finally...

"Not now."

He felt the words whisper against his face. "Wait. She needs us now. We'll have time."

Matt nodded. He was home. He could wait.

(thirty)

They put her to bed and pressed thousands of kisses to her cheeks and forehead and made her squirm and wipe off her face, gagging and laughing. "I'm all wet!" she cried, and by the time they'd finished with the torture, she was exhausted and thoroughly happy. Together they whispered good night, shut the door behind them, walked out into the kitchen.

They stared at each other. The kitchen lights were dim and yellow. Mohinder looked sort of golden beneath them.

"What now?" Matt asked awkwardly, shuffling to the far end of the room.

Mohinder smiled shyly.

"I think," he said softly, tentatively, "now is the time we stop waiting."

That was enough. It was all he needed to hear. Matt was turning toward him, walking back across the room toward him. His face was full of purpose.

"I love you," Mohinder blurted out.

Then his voice left him entirely because Matt's hands were on his waist and Mohinder was touching his face, feeling the scratchiness of his chin and the soft hollows of his cheeks, and the world was eclipsing behind too many dark eyelashes. He couldn't see. He was drowning in happiness.

The lips that were half a breath away from his moved in a familiar rhythm, and Mohinder heard the echo of his own words in a different voice.

Then those lips, soft and true, were on his, and he was shivering and on fire. He clung to him, and they kissed until they were sure it was real, it was true, it was not twenty-nine fantasies and almosts and mistakes and not-quites, it was the one first kiss they were actually sharing. And then it was over.

Matt blinked at him earnestly. Mohinder touched his own mouth with a trembling hand.

"Funny," he said. "That didn't feel like the first time."

"No, it didn't." They were still close enough to have a single shadow.

"I've thought about it so many times," Mohinder confessed. "At least twenty."

"Thirty," Matt said, drawing his fingertips across Mohinder's mouth. The lips pursed to kiss anxiously at them. "At least."

"Yes, thirty. We've had thirty first kisses." It would be nonsensical in the morning, but for now it made perfect sense. "What do you do after you've had thirty first kisses?"

Matt shrugged. "You start on the rest of them, I suppose," he smiled.

And that is exactly what they did.

:end:

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did you find all the Easter eggs? Hint: you have to have been paying attention to the chapter titles.


End file.
